Glitched

28 - Surreal

Hertz strolled down the empty corridors of Central Meta Hospital's mental health ward. One of the lights flickered so erratically he just knew spending too long in this corridor would give him a migraine. He had to make this visit quick. Hopefully he'd be a little more enlightened by the end of it.

Finally he arrived at his destination, stopping before a door marked 'M.H. Room 15'. A quick flash of his card key and the lock clicked open, allowing him to step inside. Another door separated him from completely entering the room - metal framed, the clear windows obscured by a mesh of heavy steel. The steel structure continued along to his right, reaching up to his torso. The rest of the wall was made from double-glazed perspex. That meant whatever was kept on the other side wouldn't be bursting their way out any time soon.

Huddled in a corner sat what at first glance appeared to be an archeops, but in the blink of an eye they transformed into a human girl, her long black hair flowing neatly down her back and contrasting greatly with her white hospital clothes. He knew all about this patient, well... what the hospital knew anyway. Maybe too much for his general area, but reading up on another patient's records in a desperate bid to find a cure to the virus would hardly be frowned upon.

He hoped.

At one point she'd been chained down to the bed to stop her from damaging herself or her doctors. Eventually she'd calmed down but no one could do anything about her going back and forth between two forms. Over time she'd just learned to deal with it, and it had been deemed safe enough to unchain her and keep her in a sturdy cell. It was certainly not safe to let her go free, and Hertz hoped desperately that the sole reason wouldn't hinder him getting the information he hoped to obtain.

It was a long shot and he knew it, but the plight of the poor servine and his own family was weighing heavily on his shoulders and right now he was going to try anything in his power to track down that meowstic. His current involvement with Bootstrap's investigation into the cracks would have to wait.

He pushed a small black button to activate the microphone and cleared his throat.

The girl looked up, her body changing to the feathered form of the archeops. The narrowed eyes that peered back at him unsettled him but he refused to let it show, instead returning her look with a steely stare.

"Annie, I presume?" he said.

Her form flashed back to human again and she pushed herself to her feet. "What do you want? I took my meds at lunch."

Lunch? He glanced down at his phone. It was coming up to supper time. Surely someone must have seen her in that time? He grit his teeth together and hoped the poor creature had just lost track of time.

The girl was now hugging her knees to her chest, staring blankly at the wall and muttering over and over, "Meds at lunch... meds at lunch..." until it transformed into, "Leds at munch..."

"I'm not here for that," Hertz said loudly to get her attention. "I'm here to ask you some questions?"

"Again?" The exasperation in her voice was clear and she pushed herself to her feet and slumped back against the far wall to face him, folding her arms across her chest. "Look. I don't know what happened to me. One minute I'm at home, the next I'm in your world with this-" Flash. "Condition."

He now stared at a disgruntled archeops and shrugged. "Your condition is actually why I want to talk to you. I'm assuming you're aware of the virus that's attacking System?"

"Somewhat, yeah. Don't affect me though, does it?" She paced over to the window and stopped about mid way, repeating 'does it' under her breath over and over as though she wasn't quite sure of the words.