Chapter 2: The Procedure - A Dream of Waking Life

A torrent of air forced itself down Matt’s throat, and he heard himself gasp desperately with rasping heaves.

“Help!” he cried miserably from an all-white hospital bed. Still gasping for air, Matt forced his eyelids, heavy like lead, fully open and gaped frantically about the room. Fresh white sheets clung to his paralyzed legs, and beyond his bed, a plain white wall lined with large windows was all that separated Matt from the star-filled void of outer space scintillating with an unnaturally dense spray of luminosity.

I’m in space? Matt gawked in a terrible panic, realizing now that he couldn’t remember how he got here or even who he was beyond his own name. He turned his neck left and then right, hoping and searching for someone who might be able to help him. An infinitely curved corridor, identical in nature across its entire observable length, extended on both sides of Matt. Behind him, an assortment of office-looking doors lined the wall.

I’m alone, Matt gawked in horror, and then he suddenly remembered the towering figure and the woman’s sweet smile and the spray of blood and the blade passing through his brain. He reached for his forehead but stopped short when he saw the skin of his arms.

Old! Old! Old! Matt repeated madly in his head. His arms were littered with clustering liver spots, and his skin sagged helplessly on his withered frame.

“Someone!” Matt pleaded, and he noted with horror that his voice was that of an old man. “I need help!” Matt heard the old man say once more, and he painfully forced himself to accept that the voice was his own.

Tubes and wires and braided cords of endlessly varied gauges and colors grew like exotic follicles from Matt’s sagging upper arms, and he followed them weakly to find them attached to a hulking machine behind his bed that blinked and flashed and strobed with numerous hues. Indecipherable text streamed across multiple monitors.

A door opened to his left, and a shapely young woman emerged and began jogging toward Matt. She wore a traditional nurse’s uniform, all white, along with a white mask that covered her entire face below the eyes.

“Mr. Willish!” she called, visibly distressed by Matt’s state. At least she knows my name, Matt noted with a spoonful of relief amidst total confusion.

“Help me!” Matt called back, uncertain what he should say. I...had a bad dream? But that was more than a dream. And...I don’t know what’s going on.

“Where am I?” Matt croaked, his voice strained by oppressive age. “What’s happening?”

The nurse nodded knowingly and stroked Matt’s head compassionately. “Everything will be all right.”

She removed a syringe from the front pocket of her uniform and uncapped it. “This’ll put you back to sleep, don’t worry,” she said with serene calm despite Matt’s hysterical state.

“No, I don’t want to go back to sleep!” Matt explained with frustration, “I don’t know what’s happening. I’m an old man!”

The nurse pulled back, hesitating for a moment as she seemingly processed Matt’s warning about his age. How can you not see I’ve turned into an old man!

Her concern turned back to sweetness. “I see. That’s very good, Mr. Willish. The procedure is coming right along. You just need to go back to sleep, and then we’ll keep going with everything.”

Matt reached out to grab at her uniform and demand answers, but his arm was too weak for any more movement.

“There, there,” she said, patting his head as she injected the contents of the syringe into one of the dozens of IVs hanging from the machine behind him, all of them snaking into his veins, ravenously consuming him.

“Please!” Matt repeated once more before his mind finally submitted to sweet release.