Chapter 16: A Revelation, a Change
"Ungh…" Amy shook her head as consciousness returned to her, and she became more aware that she was lying down on a cot. Her head was still slightly throbbing, and she rubbed her temples as she sat up. She opened her eyes, and was met with blurry gray – her glasses were missing. Again.
"Ah, white-haired girl is awake. Evil genius had to draw blood while girl was asleep, and findings are very peculiar." Amy looked to where Jumba's voice was coming from, and could barely discern his purple form among the computers of the lab – they were all just blurry colors without her glasses. Wait, I'm in the lab again? Why do I always wake up here instead of the infirmary when I pass out? Jumba walked over. "Here are glasses." He handed them to her, and the room came into focus as she put them on and blinked. The computer screens all displayed different pictures of blood cells – some healthy, some filled with the same nano-objects, and some… unusual.
"What are those?" Amy asked, trying to pin down what was just so different about the strange cells. "…And why did you take my glasses? Again?"
"White-haired girl could wake up and roll over on top of them, and get glass in eyes. Not good for vision, especially with vulnerable jelly human eyeballs."
Amy chose not to respond to that. Instead, she got out of the cot, only to immediately sit back down as the throbbing intensified. It calmed down when she did. She looked around at the monitors again, staring at the strange ones. There was something… missing, from the strange cells. Something that was supposed to be inside of those cells simply wasn't. Then, it clicked.
"Why are there less of the little nano-objects in those cells?"
"Ah! Good eye, white-haired girl. You see, cells with healthier appearance are lacking in nano-object area because they are building immunity to the invasive pests. I have analyzed nano-objects isolated from blood and determined they are not naturally-occurring, as viruses are. No, these are of human design, and are getting weaker." He gestured to one of the monitors, displaying a picture of one of the nano-objects up close. "Very clever design, meant to inhibit production of certain amino acids in body. Travel exceedingly fast, and can get to whole body in less than ten seconds when entered properly."
Amy nodded, looking at the picture closely. The object was shaped like a virus, but seemed to be made of different material. It looked dead.
"Immunity-building of blood cells, and as such all body cells, is due to irregularities in the entry of our little friends." He pulled down a chart. "Objects have short lifespan, and only suppress powers for a few hours – about six or seven. According to results of studying behavior, I would say entry occurs first thing in morning when white-haired girl wakes up, and once in early afternoon. When white-haired girl is asleep powers are not active, so objects have no need to be inside body. But Jumba still cannot figure out where objects are coming from."
Amy nodded again, gazing at the pictures and thinking, trying to push past the fog inside her mind. Images flashed across her mind – the moments before she passed out, that morning, that morning… she turned to the close-up of the objects. She realized what was so odd about them.
They were red and blue.
"… the pill."
Jumba looked at Amy. "What?"
"The pill. My… my multivitamin pill. That's what…" Amy reached into her pocket and pulled out the half-dissolved pill she'd found earlier. "Doctor Jumba, could you look at this?" She handed it to him. Jumba took the bag, and dumped the little blob into a petri dish. He slid it under the microscope.
"Look at this! Thousands of objects, clustered together and squirming like worms in Earth fishing jar. This is source of objects!" He turned to Amy. "White-haired girl, where did this come from?"
"It's… the multivitamin I take twice a day. Well… part of one. It got soaked in orange juice." She looked at the picture. All of these years… and the one thing that kept me from finding out what I was went right under my nose, because I didn't know where to look for it…
"That explains how objects got into body in first place." Jumba frowned, thinking to himself. "Body is rejecting objects because pills are being taken at irregular rate, and reaction is occurring fast. Could cause serious medical problems if not handled carefully. …White-haired girl, could you possibly retrieve container of these pills, and bring to Jumba? Jumba is having idea on how to help adjustment go smoothly and without possible damage to DNA and rest of body…"
"Here." Jumba turned to look at the bottle Amy was holding out to him, before what had just happened sunk in.
"Ah, you see? Powers are kicking in already without medicine to monitor DNA. Super-speed is picking up. That will be the first gift white-haired girl will have to learn to control." He opened the bottle, and removed a handful of the red-and-blue capsules. He carefully laid them on one of his tables. "I will create substitute suppressor for white-haired girl using these pills, with slightly smaller dosage of suppressor each week. We will use this until white-haired girl can control powers on her own. I give prescription… four to five months. Until then, there is no way white-haired girl can leave ship."
"So I'm not going to find my new home for almost half a year?" Amy asked, shoulders sagging at the thought of spending five months inside.
"Precisely. We begin tomorrow. For now, stay on cot. Jumba needs to conduct more tests."
Amy sighed in exasperation. Remember, it can only get better from here… it can only go up from rock bottom. So why can't I figure out which way is up?