Z2012SITEFWAITING


 * __Waiting (based on the infirmary)__**

He felt a needle pierce his skin, and then nothing. He woke up later bewildered, he had no idea where he was, or how much time had passed. He tried to sit up only to find that he was strapped down to a table. He began to panic, realizing that he had no control over thiswhen a doctor walked in the room. He recognized the doctor from all the testing the day before and opened his mouth to ask what was going on when they hit him with a needle again. When he woke up again he was back in his room. He leapt out of bed, only to be hit with wave of dizziness, and confusion. “What have they done to me,” he murmured softly. He lay there quietly, waiting. Waiting for something to happen, waiting for the dizziness to pass, and waiting to remember. A few hours went by, and still nothing. No one came by the room, and he still felt dizzy whenever he sat up. So he just lay on his bed. He slowly began to remember details about who he was, and what was going on. He knew that he was Lee Thompson. He was 17 years old, but he had managed to get into the army to help participate in an experiment. He couldn’t exactly remember how he did that though, he thought it had something to do with false paperwork… but he wasn’t sure. He laid there waiting, and he began to remember everything. He was there to be a part of a government experiment. This experiment was going to affect the American military so drastically that they would be able to without a doubt defeat the Soviets. His real name wasn’t Lee Thompson, it was Jared Sloan. Lee Thompson was one of the boys from Jared’s hometown Compton, Mississippi who had died in the war. When they brought his body back Jared stole Lee’s identification papers and signed up for the experiment he was a part of. He was in Charleston, SC at the naval base infirmary. Yesterday had been the first day of the experiment. In the morning they had done a series of physical exams to test the participants’ stamina and agility. In the afternoon each participant had been sent to their respective rooms before the first round of injections. Jared remembered sitting down on his bed, and then nothing between then and waking up on the table. He didn’t understand why the procedure would have wiped his memory; the doctors had not mentioned that as one of the side effects… He planned to talk to them as soon as possible. He thought it was a little bit odd that no one had been by to check on him, but he assumed that there was a logical reason for it. He began to feel a little bit drowsy and laid down to sleep. When he woke up he had no idea what time it was, there was no clock in his bare room but it was dark out. His stomach grumbled and he rolled over to find a tray of food on his bedside table. It didn’t look appealing; lukewarm potatoes and chicken, but he had no real complaints and shoveled it down his throat. He washed it down with some water from the pitcher on the tray and some grapes. He wiped his mouth with the napkin provided and laid down. He didn’t know what else to do so he began to pace in his room. He did this for about an hour; still waiting on someone to check up on him but no one came. Jared thought this was odd and decided to check the door to see if it was unlocked. It was and he began opening it to walk out into the hallway, when a nurse showed up. She saw him walking out of his room and began screaming at him, “What do you think you’re doing? Did anyone tell you are UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCE TO LEAVE YOUR ASSIGNED ROOM? Get back inside!” Jared ran back into his room and shut the door. He didn’t understand why he couldn’t leave, but didn’t want to try the nurse. He decided to just wait and see what would happen next. He ended up dozing off because when he woke up next it was day time. Again there was a tray of food, but no one around. When he finished his breakfast, Jared decided to try his door again, but found it locked this time. “What am I even doing here,” he thought angrily to himself, “all I do is sit in this room, sleep, and eat when they bring me food. I have yet to see a doctor, yet to do anything really.” He decided to make sure he was awake when someone brought him lunch so that he could demand to know what’s going on. He laid down on his bed to wait. The next thing he knew the sun was streaming in through the blinds. Jared leapt out of bed. "How long have I been asleep?" He began to panic. "How many days has it been, why do I remember nothing!?" He stormed over to the door and angrily grabbed the handle, and found it unlocked. He was shocked, but quickly stuck his head out into the hallway, there was no one around. Jared slowly slunk out of the room, and left the door propped open slightly behind him. He began to walk down the hallway, taking extra care to place his feet quietly on the floor in front of him. He turned the corner of the hall and there was still no one there. He heard a voice from somewhere behind him. There was nowhere else to go so Jared rushed into the open closet on his right. He shut the door quickly behind him. He crouched down in the dark waiting anxiously for someone to find him and send him back to his room, but no one came. As his breathing slowed, his eyes began to adjust to the darkness. He realized that there was more to this closet than just mops and paper towels, there was some kind of door in the corner behind the shelves. He started to inch towards the shelf, to see what exactly it was. His fingers brushed the dark outline of what was very clearly a door. He found the door handle and pushed the door gently forward. The room he found was full of file cabinets, all arraigned in a circle around a table. The table had a single rickety chair and a swinging light bulb which flickered slowly. Jared walked over to the table. There was a single journal on the table; it was marked as Lee Thompson. His heart began to pound as he reached out towards the journal. “What will I find here?” he wondered as he opened to the first page. He began to read “October 3rd 1972: Today was the first round of testing for eligible participants. We conducted physical examinations and then administered the first round of the drug to all of the participants. Lee Thompson passed all the tests with flying colors, we will check on him tomorrow to see if he is eligible to participate in our real experiment. October 4th, 1972: we have identified Lee Thompson as the ideal test candidate for the real experiment. The other 19 subjects will be kept in the Infirmary to undergo a training series and placebo experiments. Lee will be transferred to solitary confinement in the Annex for further testing. November 19th, 1972: Lee is responding to the tests like none of the previous subjects before. He is actually changing due to the drug. His speed and agility have increased with each round of testing. We have to continually monitor his progress. In early February we can begin to administer the drugs which will make the modifications.” Jared stopped reading, “what modifications!? What have they done to me!?” When he signed up to do an experiment, he thought it was going to be testing new devices, not being physically examined. Jared began to panic, “what is today’s date, what have they done to me, why can’t I remember anything at all about this experiment!?” He turned the most recent journal entry “April 28th, 1973: Lee’s status has recently taken a turn for the worse, he has become more restless, and he is constantly seeking answers. We are concerned that the drug is starting to disagree with his mental state. He believes that he is someone named Jared Sloan, and tells our nurses to stop referring to him as Lee. He also believes that he is still in the Infirmary and asks for the other patients. He will not accept our explanation that we are in, doing a different experiment. Tomorrow we are having the Admiral come and run an examination on his mental state. We believe that he may have schizophrenia, which means that we will have to remove him from this experiment.” Jared stopped reading. He needed to find a way out of this supposed “Annex” He put the journal down on the table where he found it. He needed to go back to his room and think about everything he had just read When he turned around he ran into the Admiral. Admiral Swales took a deep breath, “Lee what are you doing in here? You know you’re not authorized to leave your room; it could tamper with all of the tests. Let me take you back, and get you something to calm you down, you look a little overwhelmed.” Jared couldn’t respond and he allowed the Admiral to take him back to his room. He laid down in his bed, thinking. He needed a way out of there, and he needed it fast. The next day Admiral Swales conducted the psychological exam on Jared, and pronounced Lee Thompson as a schizophrenic. The experiments, tests, and modifications were put to a stop. Lee began receiving doses of Risperidone daily to try to counteract his disorder, until August, 8th 1996. He spent 23 years receiving schizophrenia treatments. The cleaning crew found the source of his death the next day when they came to retrieve the body. They found a wad of partially chewed risperidone pills under the nightstand. It took 23 years but Lee gathered enough Risperidone to “get out of there” and end his life.