Malign Effect

Chapter 2

"What was that?" the doctor asked, walking up to tap at one of the holographic screens next to my hospital bed. Stats and information flashed on the screen far too fast for me to read backwards from my side of it.

"Er, nothing. Just freaking out a little bit," I said, rubbing at my arms. It was way too cold in this place. A hot shower would be great; it seemed like my whole body had been soaked in cold, sticky sweat while I slept. The doc gave me a glance, frowning slightly at my response. Damn, that was supposed to lighten the mood.

"Well, I can't say that isn't unexpected in cases like this. Really, what we weren't expecting was for you to be so coherent after Dr. Daelin had to sedate you just to prevent you from hurting yourself," Doc told me, contemplating whatever readings the machine was giving him. I furrowed my brow.

"Dr. Daelin?" I asked, shifting to find a more comfortable position on the bed. My heart rate was decreasing, if the beeps coming from the machine were any indication. Absently, I brought up my hands and cracked my knuckles out of nervous habit.

"The salarian who found you during your strange episode. He tried to calm you down, and sedated you when it became apparent you were too deep in your hysterics to recognize his attempts for what they were," he explained. As soon as the word salarian exited his mouth, I was overcome with a strong sense of déjà vu.

"I feel like I should know this… Pardon my ignorance, Doc; what exactly is a salarian?" I asked. I felt my cheeks heat up at the queer look he sent me. He immediately typed something into the console he was reading from, his brow furrowing as he read he computer's response. After a moment, he turned back to me.

"Are you sure you don't know? Think about it for a moment; see if it comes to you," he said. I stopped for a moment and cleared my head, then tried to pull the information from my reluctant mind. A few vague images of a bipedal creature with large, black eyes came to my mind, but more vivid memories evaded me. It was on the tip of my tongue, but just like my wife's name, it wouldn't come to me. I shook my head.

"That's not all that's missing in my head, Doc. I can't…" I trailed off for a second and swallowed the lump in my throat, "I can't remember my wife's name." There was a long silence as the doctor regarded me with an unnervingly blank gaze.

"Mr. Shaffer, you've never been married," he said. I blinked.

"Repeat that, Doc?"

"You've never had a wife," he told me. This time, I snorted.

"Right. I think I'm in a better position to know my own marital status than you, Doc," I spat, my voice suddenly caustic. My caretaker took a step back, throwing his hands up non-threateningly.

"Please, I didn't mean to upset you; it's just that we have no record of you having been married. We were unable to identify any next of kin when Daelin brought you in," he explained. My stomach lurched and my hands clenched into fists involuntarily. Doc took another step back. I forced myself to breathe deeply and slowly relaxed my tense muscles. God knows I didn't want to go into hysterics again, I thought with a sigh. I might not come back this time.

"I'm sorry. I don't mean to be so…" I trailed off, unable to find the words. Doc lowered his hands, eyeing me contemplatively.

"It's alright. These things are expected after a traumatic experience. Though, no one seems to be sure what exactly happened to you. It might be a long shot if you're suffering gaps in your memory as you say, but do you think you could help fill in the blanks for me?" he asked.

"I…" Something stopped me from telling him. My eyes went from Doc to the wireless monitor beside me, then to the holographic interface floating in front of the door across the room. There was an itch in the back of my mind, a niggling notion that something was off.

"I think I had some sort of panic attack. One moment, I was just walking through the… the wards, but then everything seemed to get hazy. Suddenly, I felt this horrible pain, like someone had lit every nerve in my body on fire, and I was overcome by intense, irrational fear. It was like nothing I'd ever experienced before," I finally explained. Doc brought his hand to his chin and looked down to the floor, apparently perplexed.

"A seizure, perhaps? It doesn't seem right, but with those symptoms and your amnesia…" he trailed off, sounding uncertain.

"Your guess is as good as mine, Doc," I shrugged. He was still for a moment longer, face shadowed under the ceiling lights, before he looked back up at me.

"We'll run some scans later today. In the meantime, I want you to try and get some more rest," he said, and turned to leave. I blinked, and hurriedly caught his attention before he made it out.

"Uh, Doc, I never got your name?" I asked, almost sheepish. He chuckled a little.

"How rude of me! Doctor Bradley Danvers," he told me, just before the door hissed open and he left me alone.


Boredom set in fast. Despite a heavy feeling of exhaustion that kept my eyes half-lidded and my movements sluggish, I couldn't quite manage to drift off to sleep. Every time I finally started to nod off, the worry and fear would tighten in my chest, and my mind would begin to race anew with questions. Where was my wife? What was a salarian? What year was it?

I wanted to get out of the damned hospital. I needed to sort this mess out and get back to my life. I was likely out of a job, and way behind the curve on the technology that I'd made my living on. I had no fucking idea how I was going to pay my hospital bills.

Beyond that, there was the omnipresent feeling of déjà vu, and the warning bells going off in the back of my head telling me that I was missing something both obvious and important. I felt as if there was something that I needed to do as soon as possible, but I had no idea what it was. As weak as I was, my skin itched with the desire to get up and move, logic be damned. Rationally, though, I knew that I had no idea what I'd find even just outside the doors of my hospital room, and that I was most likely to see my wife again if I just waited for her to find me. It was maddening, and it was keeping me awake even more so than the fear that I'd find myself listening to that terrible voice again once I fell asleep.

I sat back up with a heavy sigh. There was no way my mind was going to let me rest. The ice-cold floor wasn't pleasant to stand on, but I couldn't bring myself to lay in the bed anymore. The sheets were sticky with cold sweat anyway. There wasn't much to my room; the only furnishings were my bed and the beeping heart monitor. There wasn't a TV or even a window. The walls, ceiling and floor were all white with red accents, which made me glad that the lights had dimmed after the Doc left so that I could sleep. Bright colors give me migraines.

Glancing at the door's holographic interface, though, gave me odd idea. If we'd advanced that far…

"AI, what time is it?" I asked, looking to the ceiling. My cheeks burned slightly as I spoke. I hope no one was looking in on me if I was making a fool of myself. I nearly toppled over when a glowing, purple avatar materialized not one foot to my right. The heart monitor spazzed with me.

"AI are illegal in Council Space, Tre Shaffer; I am Aela, an advanced Virtual Intelligence, programmed to assist patients and staff of Huerta Memorial Hospital. It is currently fifteen thirty-one, Galactic Standard Time," she spoke, her voice obviously synthesized. At first glance, I thought her avatar was human. It didn't take long to notice the tentacles that made up her scalp, though. Again, the déjà vu made my skin crawl. It was scratching at the back of my brain, just beyond my consciousness - I should know this.

"Er, alright," I almost stuttered, still tense from the scare, "Aela, what species is your avatar modeled after?" The avatar smiled, its glowing eyes lifeless. Fuck, that was creepy.

"My avatar is modeled after the mono-gendered asari, the oldest of the Council Races. First to achieve interstellar flight and discover the Citadel, the asari have life-spans measured in centuries. They are well-known for their grace, beauty, and wisdom," Aela recited dully. At least she wasn't monotone. Two guesses who had programmed this response, though.

"What other avatars do you have?" The question was hesitant. Oddly, despite my intense curiosity, I suddenly almost didn't want to know

"I have no other avatars," she said, her expression becoming contrite. The way it just froze like that, eugh. I decided that I didn't like VIs. I opened my mouth to ask my real question, but hesitated again. The 'off' feeling was growing more intense by the second.

"Aela, what is a salarian? Can you show me a picture of one?" The itch under my skin won out. I had to know.

"Salarians were the second species to settle on the Citadel. Their defining traits include an amphibian musculature, an exceedingly high metabolism, a remarkable intelligence, and an average forty-year lifespan," she droned on, but my attention was riveted to the multitudes of pictures that had come into existence around her avatar. Huge, black eyes, curved horns, grayish skin tones. For several moments, I stared blankly. Salarians. Just like that, the shattered pieces of my mind were shoved back into place. Painfully.

"F-fuck," I breathed, covering my mouth with trembling fingers. I stumbled backward until my back hit the wall on the other side of the room, the heart monitor drowning out the rest of Aela's explanation. I didn't need to hear it anyway.

"It wasn't a dream. Oh, God, it wasn't a dream," I whispered, my voice almost cracking. I'd been pretending, of course. I'd already known it wasn't a dream; the moment Danvers had spoken about my 'panic attack,' I'd known. It was so much more than that, though. Christ, there was so much more.

"Mr. Shaffer!" The Doc chose that moment to come running into the room, two nurses following behind him. I was disappointed when they didn't immediately sedate me. Instead, Danvers kneeled to my eye level - when had I sat down? - and spoke with an obviously fake calm.

"Come back, Tre. Nothing's going to hurt you. You're safe here. There aren't any salarians-" I cut him off with a choked, sobbing laugh. I wasn't afraid of salarians. I had lived on the Citadel for years now, after all. In that kind of environment, you get used to them pretty quick.

What scared me was that this wasn't a dream, and I knew it. My life here was as real as it could get. My friends, my family, and my wife, though? My life back home, on Earth, during the 21st century?

That might be made up.


A/N: Reviews are really appreciated. Good or bad, let me know; best I figure out whether this is worth continuing early on.