11. The Volunteer

Log entry, entered 15 days ago

I enter the Dr. McKenzie’s office and she greets me with a big smile on her face. I have never seen it before, we’ve only interacted via e-mail.

“Dr. McKenzie. It is an honor to meet you in person finally.”

“Please, call me Charlie,” she responds. “There’s no need for formalities here—not at this stage.”

“My apologies. Charlie. I have to admit I am still a bit nervous.”

“It is only natural, Trev. Do you mind if I call you Trev?”

“Morris, at the very least, please.”

“Fair enough!”

She continues to speak at me and I respond at reasonable intervals. She tells me how we are at the “precipice of something great” and that we will “change the future for the better.”

“You would be the first of many to come. The ultimate deterrents. The end to all war,” she says. Her pupils dilate, she is way more enthusiastic about this than I am. But I have agreed to the procedure. And she said it will be safe.

Log entry, entered 7 days ago

I am lying on a bed on the second floor, the Healthcare Department they call it. I recognize the logos and icons around me. We have used supplies either developed or produced here in the field. Memories flash by.

I am on the fifth floor of an abandoned tenement building in Ankara. I am seated and I look down on the floor to see Collin. His left hand is gone. The door to this room we’re in was rigged. I pick out the first-aid kit. An injection to trigger coagulation, disinfectants to clean the wound, and bandage to keep it isolated.

I am kneeling behind a dumpster in Zurich. There is a bullet in my left thigh. My shooter is already dead, killed with a single bullet to the head. I know I don’t need to remove the bullet, but the wound must be closed. I take out a cauterizer—designed specifically for bullet wounds for situations exactly like this. It hurts, but I can keep moving

Now I look around me and see the IV bag that’s feeding me something directly into my veins. Charlie enters the room as I observe the IV.

“This will prepare you for the next step. You might feel some… growing pains. Yeah, let’s call it that. It’s going to feel like you’re itching. Like when babies are teething, you know? You’ll want to itch and itch and itch, but that’s not going to make you stop. Let us know if and when that happens, so we can give you something to reduce the irritation.”

Her calmness and confidence makes me feel better about this situation. I don’t have any regrets and I don’t want to. But I don’t think I could go back after this point, even if I wanted to.

Log entry, entered 3 days ago

Someone enters the room, but everything is blurry now. From the silhouette, I can tell this is Charlie. I can recognize her breathing, her footsteps, her heartbeat. These new senses are weird to me, but I welcome them. I’m still nervous, but just a little.

“Can you… Can you repeat it for me, one more time? I just want to know,” I say. She smiles, that same smile from the first day, and starts to explain.

“Of course. It is a simple procedure, developed by myself and my very talented colleagues. But it remains experimental, as I have stated several times.

“The serum we have given you has worked wonders. Your muscle mass has increased significantly, but not all parts of your body are able to keep up with such rapid growth. As such, we will need to install some cybernetic enhancements.”

She looks at my right arm, which is notably smaller than my left. It is an cyber prosthetic after all.

“We will replace your existing, but old, cybernetics with new, better ones. This will make up for the inefficiencies of the serum. That being said, the serum was never intended to provide a full solution. It was always going to be supplemented by augmentations.”

“I understand,” I say. Strange, her pulse rate has increased.

Log entry, entered 1 day ago

I am floating. It is warm but I am cold. A tube goes down my throat. There is pain. Nothing in particular hurts, but everything is pain.

My eyes are open and I stare down at myself, but what I see isn’t me. My skin is broken, my limbs aren’t mine, and my chest is wide open.

My chest is wide open.

I want to breathe but I have no lungs. I cannot hear my heartbeat for I have no heart. Instead, there is a metal box. It connects directly into my spine. I can hear the electricity.

I am trapped.

I am trapped.

I want to get out. I want to get out. I need to get out. I need to get out. I NEED TO GET OUT.

Log entry, entered 4 hours ago

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