[Round 0 - Main]
[Kill a living being to join the rounds. The rest will die.]
Time left before the first round:
[23:41:36]
It was unlike any birth.
There was no joyful emotion that conjured up when a child, crying in its glory, was born.
Instead, there was shock.
The intern, whose name I managed to catch by looking at his ID, Johnny D Evans was first to be angered.
"Murderer!" he said, pointing his index finger at me.
I looked down in shame
Then, deliberation.
Johnny countered, "Why couldn't you catch the child? He was right there!"
Then, denial.
Doctor Jame sighed. "Who is to say that the child is dead? Schneider, check its pulse."
And at last, grief.
I slowly walked towards the infant, grabbing its tiny arm which was the size of a sausage and was layered with bruised skin and fat. The infant was face down as I pressed two fingers on its wrist.
My breath quickened, my tear ducts urging to flow.
"It's dead. Near rigor mortis, even."
The other intern, a female whose name I could not manage to catch, gasped. Then ran out of the operating room.
Johnny walked towards me and the child, his hands extending. At first, I had thought that he was helping me up so I grasped his hand.
He slapped my hand away and cradled the child.
"A moment," said Doctor Jame, her eyes set on the child that was propped up by Johnny. She shook her head. "Before that, how's the mother?"
I groggily stood up and checked the lady's pulse. My body felt heavy with every step. I had committed a grave sin that not even angels could beguile me into thinking it was not.
Pressing two fingers right on the veins of the woman's wrist, her body had turned stiff in the short moments of our horror, I sighed.
"Dead as well."
Jame hummed. "Was it from the pain of childbirth or shock?"
"Shock?" I retorted.
Her words alerted me. I hadn't an idea what she meant.
The doctor jerked her into the direction of Johnny. He embraced the child tighter, but I could tell that there was something strange with the child.
From behind, it was difficult to pinpoint but from the front it was as clear as day.
The face of the child was bruised purple as though it had been struck a handful of times, as though it suffocated inside its mother's womb. Strangely, that made sense. The child was heavier and bulkier than usual, its head like an inflated balloon with the eyes seemingly about to burst. Threads of veins popped through the skin in odd areas and had full grown teeth and swollen gums.
Doctor Jame excused herself to inform someone. The dual doors of the operating room fluttered shut.
I solitarily kept to my thoughts on the opposite corner to Johnny, who was still embracing the child. He glared at me through his fringe.
Johnny was a first-year medical technology student from a nearby university that was also owned by the director of the hospital (and I assume that the girl intern who had left was the same). It wasn't the first time that I had met him as he had an internship here, but, even then, who could forget him?
He had dark hair that was styled like a mullet and had a long fringe that crossed against his face. Akin to alternative rockstars, the clothing he sported was often dark colored and often had studs, spikes, and sometimes an animal's tail. He made sure to incorporate that to his scrubs. Rather than spiked and studded leather cuffs, he would wear spiked piercings and silver rings.
But, even then, he wasn't allowed to enter the operating room with all those, so he looked rather plain right then.
Our eyes met. He glared at me again.
"Intern Evans," I began, "how is the child doing?"
"Not breathing, most definitely."
It felt like a vein popped on my forehead.
I stood up and dusted my scrub which had dried blood from the fiasco.
"It needs to be examined, surely."
"And who is the MedTech student?"
I breathed out in exasperation.
"Don't get too arrogant when you're still a first-year."
He snorted. "Ah, yes. The ever-awaited 'adults are superior!' talk."
I was only twenty-seven years young… He was practically begging for me to snap and lay my hands on him.
Though I was almost seething, I made sure to be stoic.
"Johnny, I hope you understand that I didn't mean to cause death to that child."
No response.
Johnny approached the sink. Firstly, he turned the faucet on and tested the temperature with his palm then grabbed a basin and filled it with water, scrubbing the blood off the corpse of a baby with mild dish soap.
Opening the storage closet, he grabbed an extra blanket, ripped it in multiple patches. He wrapped the corpse with it.
I exhaled, but was slightly relieved. Walking nearer to Johnny who seemed to have calmed down, I asked:
"Then, what do you plan to do with the child?"
"It's a child, a dead one. It needs a proper burial," said Johnny matter-of-factly.
How kind, I thought internally. It was cruel of me to be relieved of the moment when I realized the child was inhuman.
As though possessed by some angel of goodwill or maybe just influenced by the sincerity of Johnny, I went to the closet and grabbed an extra blanket.
I loosely draped over the female corpse's body with the blanket, slightly aware of the gaze of Johnny.
[Johnny D Evans will remember that]
The appearance of the screen stunned me. I tripped, landing on my arse.
In front of me was a translucent interface similar to the "round" interface.
Having a go at it, I tried to touch the interface but my hand simply went through it like water. It was not like air where you don't feel it when you touch it, it was more similar to liquid.
I stood up and checked if Johnny could see this.