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“Is it safe for her to be doing that?” A woman asked. Two people sat alone in a room, a large television display in front of them showing a live video feed from a patient room. The woman who’d asked the question was holding a digital tablet in her hand, scratching down notes with her stylus as she spoke with her counterpart. Her counterpart, a man, sat with his arms crossed over his chest while he devoted himself to the screen in front of him. “She’s been cleared for this much physical activity. Her doctor has her under close supervision, and she is being given a physical every 12 hours.” He replied. “I wouldn’t have cleared her for this. She’s struggling to do basic exercises, Jonathon!” She replied, lowered her tablet and pointing to screen with her stylus. There, on that screen, was the live feed of a woman trying to perform pushups on the floor of her patient room. Dressed in a pair of loose blue pants and a white tee shirt, she almost seemed normal apart from how skinny she was. Her daily meal plan wasn’t designed to fatten her up. It was a carefully measured combination of proteins, fats, and carbs providing precisely the amount of vitamins and minerals her body would need to recover from her ordeal. And all the while, her prescribed medications were a cocktail almost as bad as what she’d been subjected to before. Everything they were putting into her was to careful wean her off of the old drugs, and to slowly bring her up to good health, rather than to force it. She’d been forced to do enough as it is. No more. “Her psychologist insisted we allow her this much. This was her whole life, reduced down to that.” He replied, breaking one arm away from the other to point to the screen, to point at the woman struggling to do a set of pushups. He took the time to explain himeself. “Her primary physician is a military doctor; he dresses the part every time he meets with her. All of the nursing staff wear the same. We had a team put together uniforms they would have used forty years ago. All this girl knows how to do is listen and obey, and when any of her doctors show up in uniform she listens and obeys. This is her world right now, and our first goal is to get her physically healthy again. Her shrink says it’ll be easier for us to do that if we keep her in a familiar place, something she understands.” “I understand the logic of it, but I can do better pushups than that. If she hurts herself that’ll set us back.” She replied. “We’re continuing this plan, if she does hurt herself, we’ll reevaluate based on her condition, but for now, she’s doing well enough. Weight is increasing in small increments as planned, and it looks like we can drop one of her medications soon.” He told her. The woman tapped her tablet’s screen a few times, studying the device with a furled brow. “The Oxlindaphin?” She asked. “I believe that’s the one. The worst of the long-term effects of her daily stimulants have been curtailed. Remarkable to see it happen in person.” He replied. The stimulants the patient had been subjected to every day for her entire service career were designed to keep her from sleeping, designed to keep the effects of not sleeping from having negative effects, they were designed to keep her mind sharp, sharper than would be natural. It was a cocktail of drugs designed to turn a person into a weapon, and through great trial and error, and countless dead bodies, the Union Authority had figured out the exact combination of chemicals that worked. GenJocks were tireless, ceaseless, obedient. They were just like the monsters they were fighting but untethered from a hivemind. They could, even drugged as they were, act with independent thought with reaction times only a computer could top. Except a computer was predictable. The hivemind could outwit a fleet of drones, and it did outwit them until the Union Authority was teetering on the edge of being overrun. But it couldn’t outwit a fleet of GenJocks. In the name of victory the Union Authority created its own monsters, by acting like monsters themselves by putting countless thousands through a program that left so many dead. “She’s blessed.” The woman replied. “She is, though from what her shrink is saying, I don’t think she’ll ever know it. Doesn’t believe she’s capable anymore.” He said, still staring at the woman on the screen as she struggled to complete her next push up. The patient collapsed to the floor exhausted, and a nearby nurse in uniform had to assist her, helping the patient rise. There wasn’t any audio, but the body language was there. The nurse was telling the patient to stop, and the patient listened and obeyed before returning to their bed to rest. He stared at her, a tiny face in the screen. There wasn’t anything in that face that he could see. This wasn’t a machine pretending to be a person, this is what a person looked like when they’ve been reduced to moving parts. Blessed. ---------- “This is General Wallace Brinks joining us on the program today! Hello, thank you for being with us this morning.” The host said with a smile. She was a sharply dressed woman, all in red, heels, the works. There was a smile on her face, but the way she extended her hand to the General betrayed her opinion of the man. Her body language projected a coldness that could freeze tap water. “Yes, thank you having me.” The General replied, who was a gentleman in his late 40s. The two took their seats on the stage, the General in a large and comfortable looking brown seat, with hardwood arms with worn out tops from years of service to a nightly show that had been running since the end of the war. The host had her seat behind a small, austere-looking desk, and on the opposite side of the seating arrangement was the program’s first guest sitting in a chair identical to the General’s. “Now, I know we’ve been told your pressed for time, so let me just push right in before our next break. Why are you here with us today specifically, because I tried very hard, been trying for months, to arrange an interview with Ms. Ford. But they gave me you instead, so why you?” The host began, revealing the source of her coldness. Her tone was direct, biting, with every bit of her body language angled sharply at her opponent. “I’m the most educated on the matter of GenJocks, and it was decided that someone with my level of expertise was needed to speak to the issue. Your program reaches a lot of people, Miss Dunham, so your venue felt most appropriate.” The General replied, his voice unwavering in the face of his adversary. “Well, I don’t think someone like you can answer the questions I would have had for Ms. Ford. Apart from two public appearances, and brief ones at that! Apart from those two glimpses we’ve not seen her. I would have liked to have her on this stage to speak with her the way she deserves to be spoken to after what she’s been put through.” She replied sharply, Mrs. Dunham having been a vocal advocate for the wellbeing of Ms. Ford, whose situation was now on every news station across all of the UAG. The General smiled politely and nodded in patiently, his features calm. “I understand where you are coming from, but please do try me anyway. Ask me one of your questions, one you’d might have asked Lieutenant Ford.” He replied, adjusting his posture to something more comfortable. There was a moment of pause, where Mrs. Dunham stared at the General, then she leaned back into her seat and her expression shifted. With an irritated sneer, she let out a held breath. “Ms. Ford, you’ve been asleep for forty years. How do you feel?” Miss Dunham asked the General, venom on her tongue with every word. He continued to smile. “Miss Dunham, I want you to understand that what I am going to say is spoken with the fullest measure of truth a man can muster. You want to know how Lieutenant Ford is feeling right now? She feels nothing, Miss Dunham. We took that away from her forty years ago, about a year after she was conscripted. We broke her down mentally and then rebuilt her with a cocktail of drugs that turned her into the perfect pilot. If she were here in this chair instead of me, she would only be capable stare at you blankly-“ “That’s nonsense!” She interrupted him sharply. “She would have no answer to give you.” He finished. “Let me interview her to see that for myself!” She demanded. “It is the truth.” He replied back. “You people left her in a coffin for four decades, Mr. Brinks, and now that she’s finally free you have her caged up in a hospital and you won’t let anyone see her to verify if what your saying is true!” She shot back. He inhaled quietly before letting it back out. “My predecessors authorized a great many unethical things, and we are now trying to make right to those wrongs. Lieutenant Ford is not in a position to engage with you or I the same way that we are engaging with each other right now. Her mind works anymore; it would be putting her through more abuse to try.” He replied. “So, you say! So the other talking heads all say. Every piece of reporting makes excuses for why you won’t let her out, to let her have even a sliver of freedom, of what she’s been denied for almost her entire life!” Miss Dunham shouted, her hand clapping the top of her desk. “Call us talking heads or any other derogatory term you wish, but it will not change the truth. Lieutenant Ford is no longer the woman she-“ “Stop calling her Lieutenant! She’s not one of you anymore God dammit!” She cut him off. ---------- With strokes of a stylus, the nurse began to take down a few notes on a digital tablet. Her heart rate was healthy, and no signs of arrhythmia. She would still need to stay on her blood pressure medication, but at least it was working. He checked the notes that had been taken the evening prior, saw that they were much the same as the ones he’d collected so far this morning. Very little change, which was good. She was now down to only seven medications in addition to her curated diet and physical rehabilitation routines. He finished that, then sat the tablet down on the table. Next to the tablet was a small narrow thermometer. Her physicals were thorough, measuring as much as could be measured provided it did not require a trip to another part of the hospital to use a machine. He popped the cap on the thermometer and approached the bed. Sitting on the side of the bed was the patient. “Open your mouth, please.” He told her, and she obeyed. She opened her mouth, and he inserted the tip of the thermometer so it slid beneath her tongue. He told her to shut her mouth, she did, and then a few moments later it beeped, and he pulled it free. 98.7 degrees. He turned his attention back to the tablet and marked down her temperature. Most of her vitals were constants, with a few outliers related to her physical condition which were all related to the prolonged stasis she endured. The extreme atrophy her body went through was proving to be the most stubborn of her physical ailments. Next, he began to prep a needle to take fresh blood samples. He would need to fill several vials to accommodate the large number of tests that would be run. Her blood was being rigorously examined for everything even though her condition had been stable for the last month. He removed an elastic tourniquet and told her to extend her left arm. She did, and he tied the tourniquet around her arm just above the elbow. “There will be a small pinch.” He told her as he felt around the inside of her elbow, using his thumb to push and pull at the thin layer of her fur until he found a good vein to use. He stuck her, and she didn’t so much as flinch. He snapped the first of eight vials into the collector, then waited for it to fill before removing it. He repeated this until he’d filled every vial, then quickly labeled each one with the patient’s name. Out of professional habit he turned to her and offered one vial, showing her the label. “This you?” He asked, knowing it was pointless since it was obviously hers, but some habits die hard. “Yes, Sir.” She replied in a monotone. He lowered the vial and placed it with the others inside a small plastic tray and then sealed it with a lid. He double checked the labels on the tray to ensure they were correctly marked, then he stepped over to the patient room door and opened it. “Samples here.” He announced. Another nurse on standby hopped out of her chair from a nearby desk and hurried over. He handed her the small tray, then watched her leave. As she made her way down the hall two armed marines pivoted from their guard posts and began to follow her down to the labs. Every part of the patient was under armed guard, even her samples. He stepped back into the room, shutting the door behind him, and returned to his tablet. He was not her only attending nurse or physician. She had a very large team devoted to her care, and as he scrolled through the outstanding items that needed doing every morning and evening, he found that very little was left for him to do. “I need to check your weight. You can-“ He stopped himself mid-sentence, looking over at her as she continued to sit at the edge of her bed. The tourniquet was still wrapped around her arm as he’d not removed it himself. “You can remove it, the tourniquet.” He told her. He watched as she looked down and stared for a moment at the blue elastic band tied around her arm. She then reached for it and began to pull at it ineffectually. After a moment he stopped her and removed it for her. He discarded the tourniquet, then went back to where he’d left off. “I’ll need to take your weight. Please use the scale.” He told her. She slid off the bed. He made sure to turn away from her. As he listened to the sound of clothing being removed behind him, he focused on the tablet, scrolling through its display and double checking for anything that might have been missed, whatever he could read that would draw his focus away from the woman behind him as she used the scale to measure her naked weight. “125.8” She recited. The weight scale was located at the end of her bed and had a digital screen. “Thank you, you can dress yourself.” He told her without looking. As he listened to the activity behind him, he updated her chart with the weight. She was down 0.3lbs from yesterday evening’s weight. A normal fluctuation. He finally turned around, and found her standing next to her bed, dressed again in her whites and blues. He stepped around her and the bed and found the weight scale, then tapped the surface with his foot. The screen lit up, displaying the previous weight recording. The number read 125.8 before resetting back to 0.0. “All of your numbers look good this morning. I’ll make sure breakfast is brought for you, now that you’ve had your blood drawn.” He told her, returning to the small table again. He began to collect the handful of items he’d brought with him. With everything in hand or in his pockets, he made a last check on the tablet but spent most of his time looking at her schedule. “At 10am you will be taken for physical therapy. Lunch at noon. 2:30 is your next appointment with Dr Sinclair.” He told her. “Yes, Sir.” She replied. He turned to look at her, and she was still standing there, arms at her sides, staring at him like she was waiting. He hesitated. “You can be at ease.” He told her awkwardly, nodding at her like he’d been told to do. There was a subtle shift in her body, but she didn’t move from her spot. He sighed, nodding again but more to himself than to her. “Breakfast will be here soon.” He told her again, then quickly left the room. Once he was out, he signaled to one of the marines stationed in the hallway, informing him that the morning’s blood draw had been finished and that the patient could be served breakfast. The marine took the message and used the radio on his chest to call it in. Nothing was normal with their new patient, even breakfast had armed guard. And even he was under armed guard as he left the patient behind him with a marine following in his wake to make sure he reached his next destination. As he walked, he passed by colleagues, locking eyes with each of them briefly. No one wanted her here.