Chapter 5
Stasis Shock
Ethan opened his eyes to a view of white lights burrowed inside a textured ceiling that beamed down at him. Motor functions took no time to recover this time, however, and he sat up quickly. A steel blue blanket covered his legs, and a curtain was drawn around the vicinity of the bed that held him. His heart raced frantically while he placed the clues together, but a firm hand rested on his shoulder. Ethan looked to his left and spotted a middle-aged man dressed in a white coat. The doctor sported a light stubble and short peppered hair.
“Calm down, son,” he said. “You’ve had quite the trip.”
“Where am I?” Ethan stammered.
“You’re in the campus clinic. Paramedics brought you here after you fainted.”
Fainted? Ethan shook his head and slapped his cheeks to bring back the blood flow. The doctor didn’t know then, at least not yet anyway. What would he do if he knew? What should be done about it at all?
“Right,” Ethan said. “I should get going.”
Ethan slid off his blanket, prepared to ask for his clothes when the doctor stood up.
“I’m not an idiot,” he said. “I know stasis shock when I see it.”
Ethan paused, remaining on the bed. He cautiously looked at the man, someone who must have seen his condition dozens of times. Powell might not have guessed it. That was reasonable, but not him.
“Sorry, Doc, but I don’t know anything else.”
“I can’t make you do it, but you need to find other ways to occupy your time.”
“For how long?” Ethan asked.
“I won’t know for sure unless you let me run some tests, but I’d say about six months.”
“You can’t be serious!” Ethan shouted before tuning his voice down. “This is my life.”
He glared at the doctor with the meanest stare he could muster, though it came off much less potent than he desired, more like begging after the fact. Ethan reached out to pull back the curtain enveloping his semi-private conversation, but another memory hit him and he pulled back. The memory, however, was not one from his stasis sim. He recalled a number of his friends who used to game with him, the last one being Merrick. Ethan shook his head and sighed. This must have been how they all felt. He had to admit. It was scary. Not having control. Lapsing at a moment’s notice. He thought of all the schoolwork he would miss and that was the least of it.
“What am I supposed to do?” Ethan asked. “How do I deal with it?”
“Let me run some tests,” the man said. “After that, I can prescribe a medication that will limit the frequency and duration of your episodes.”
“You can do that?” he said, excitedly.
“You’ll still have them, but you’ll miss out on less.”
Footsteps echoed from beyond the curtain. Nurses shuffled patients and filed in and out of the clinic with a frenzied hustle. Ethan was one cog in the process, though he felt out of place in the scheme of things. Gaming was his life and he wasn’t about to give that up. Six months was far too long to leave development. Ethan stared up at the lights while his attention drifted.
“Listen, son, I’m not going to give you those pills if you just use them to cope with more stasis.”
“I’m not stupid,” Ethan said.
“I hope not,” the Doctor replied. “I hope you do the right thing.”
Ethan hopped off the bed and shook the doctor’s hand with a firm grip. It wasn’t as if the thought never crossed his mind. It was tempting. He granted that. However, as Ethan passed through the curtain and the bigger lights hit his eyes, an unsettling feeling boiled up in his stomach. Maybe staying off was the better call, but he didn’t need to quit permanently. Ethan didn’t plan on ending up like his friends, who vanished at the first sign of discomfort. He planned to make it through the scores of lapses that lurked ahead in the months to come. Time was the only thing that stood between him and his future.
“I can wait,” he said to the doctor before trailing off.
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