Mirror Dance

Surely she would come back. Before, he had passed out, or been knocked out; this time natural sleep came to him. He didn’t exactly like it— if I should die before I wake—but it served his body’s craving, and blotted out the pain.

Slowly, he gained control of his left arm. Then he made his right leg twitch. His beautiful lady came back and fed him more sugar water, but with no more sweet kisses for dessert. By the time he compelled his left leg to twitch, she came back again, but this time there was something terribly wrong.

Dr. Durona looked ten years older, and had grown cool. Cold. Her hair was parted in the middle and hung down in two smooth wings, chopped off at jaw-length, with threads of silver gleaming in the ebony. Her hands on his body, helping him to sit up, were dryer, colder, more severe. Not caressing.

I’ve gone into a time-warp. No. I’ve been frozen again. No. I’m taking too long to recover, and she’s pissed at me for making her wait. No … Confusion clogged his throat. He’d just lost the only friend he had, and he didn’t know why. I have destroyed our joy… .

She massaged his legs, very professionally, provided him with a loose patient gown, and made him stand up. He almost passed out. She put him back to bed and left.

When she came back the next time, she’d changed her hair yet again. This time it was grown long, held back tightly bound in a silver ring on the back of her head, and flowing down in a blunt-ended horse-tail with wide silver streaks running through it. She’d aged another ten years, he swore. What’s happening to me? Her manner was a little softened, but nothing so happy as at first. She walked him across the room and back, which drained him totally, after which he slept again.

He was deeply distressed when she returned once more in her cold, short-haired incarnation. He had to admit, she was efficient getting him up and moving. She barked at him like a drill sergeant, but he walked, and then he walked unassisted. She steered him outside of his room for the first time, to where a short hallway ended in a sliding door, and then back.

They’d just turned for another circuit when the door at the end hissed open, and Dr. Durona came through. She was in her horsetail morph. He stared at the wing-haired Dr. Durona beside him, and almost burst into tears. It’s not fair. You’re confusing me. Dr. Durona strode up to Dr. Durona. He blinked back the water in his eyes, and focused on their name tags. Wing-hair was Dr. C. Durona. Horse-tail was Dr. P. Durona. But where’s my Dr. Durona? I want Dr. R.

“Hi, Chrys, how’s he doing?” asked Dr. P.

Dr. C. answered, “Not too badly. I’ve just about worn him out for this therapy-session, though.”

“I should say so—” Dr. P. moved to help catch him as he collapsed. He could not make his mouth form words; they came out choked sobs. “Over-done it, I’d say.”

“Not at all,” said Dr. C., supporting his other side. Together they steered him back to bed. “But it looks like mental recovery is going to come after physical recovery, in this one. Which is not good. The pressure’s on. Lilly’s getting impatient. He has to start making connections soon, or he’ll be no use to us.”

“Lilly is never impatient,” chided Dr. P.

“She is this time,” said Dr. C. grimly.

“Will the mental recovery really follow?” She helped him lie back without falling.

“Anyone’s guess. Rowan has guaranteed us the physical. Tremendous job, that. There’s plenty of electrical activity in his brain, something has to be healing.”

“Yes, but not instantly,” came a warmly amused voice from the hallway. “What are you two doing to my poor patient?”

It was Dr. Durona. Again. She had long fine hair bunched in a messy wad on the back of her head, pure ebony dark. He peered worriedly at her name tag as she approached, smiling. Dr. R. Durona. His Dr. Durona. He whimpered in relief. He wasn’t sure he could take much more confusion, it hurt more than the physical pain. His nerves seemed more shattered than his body. It was like being in one of his bad dreams, except that his dreams were much nastier, with more blood and dismemberment, not just a green-coated woman standing all around a room arguing with herself.

“P.T. stands for Physical Torture,” Dr. C. quipped.

That explained it. …

“Come back and torture him again later,” Dr. R. invited. “But—gently.”

“How hard dare I push?” Dr. C. was intent, serious, standing with her head cocked, making notes on a report panel. “Urgent queries are coming down from above, you know.”

“I know. Physical therapy no oftener than every four hours, till I give you the go-ahead. And don’t run his heart rate above one-forty.”

“That high?”

“An unavoidable consequence of its still being undersized.”

“You have it, love.” Dr. C. snapped her report panel closed and tossed it to Dr. R., then marched out; Dr. P. wafted after her.

His Dr. Durona, Dr. R., came to his side, smiled, and brushed his hair out of his eyes. “You’re going to need a haircut soon. And new growth is starting on the bare patches. That’s a very good sign. With all that happening on the outside of your head, I think there has to be something happening on the inside, hey?”

Only if you counted spasms of hysteria as activity … a tear left over from his earlier burst of terror escaped his eye at a nervous blink. She touched its track. “Oh,” she murmured in sympathetic worry, which he found suddenly embarrassing. I am not … I am not … I am not a mutant. What?

She leaned closer. “What’s your name?”

He tried. “Whzz … d’buh …” His tongue would not obey him. He knew the words, he just couldn’t make them come out. “Whzz … yr nine?”

“Did you repeat me?” She brightened. “It’s a start—”

“Ngh! Whzz yr nine?” He touched her jacket pocket, hoping she wouldn’t think he was trying to grope her.

“What … ?” She glanced down. “Are you asking what’s my name?”

“Gh! Gh!”

“My name is Dr. Durona.”

He groaned, and rolled his eyes.

“… My name is Rowan.”

He fell back onto his head-pad, sighing with relief. Rowan. Lovely name. He wanted to tell her it was a lovely name. But what if they were all named Rowan—no, the sergeantly one had been called Chrys. It was all right. He could cut his Dr. Durona out of the herd if he had to; she was unique. His wavering hand touched her lips, then his own, but she didn’t take the hint and kiss him again.

Reluctantly, only because he didn’t have the strength to hold her, he let her pull her hand from his. Maybe he had dreamed that kiss. Maybe he was dreaming all of this.

A long, uncertain time passed after she left, but for a change he did not doze off. He lay awake, awash in disquieting, disconnected thought. The thought-stream carried odd bits of jetsam, an image here, what might be a memory there, but as soon as his attention turned inward to examine it, the flow of thoughts froze, and the tide of panic rose again. Well, and so. Let him occupy himself otherwise, only watching his thoughts at an angle, obliquely; let him observe himself reflected in what he knew, and play detective to his own identity. If you can’t do what you want, do what you can. And if he couldn’t answer the question, Who was he?, he might at least take a crack at Where was he? His monitor pads were gone; he was no longer radio-tagged.

It was very silent. He slipped out of bed and navigated to the door. It opened automatically onto the short hallway, which was dimly lit by night-strips at floor level.

Including his own, there were only four rooms off the little corridor. None had windows. Or other patients. A tiny office or monitor-station was empty—no. A beverage cup steamed on the countertop next to a switched-on console, its program on hold. Somebody would be back soon. He nipped past, and tried