The Labyrinth

Chapter 9: Testing? Testing? Is This Meta On?

Yeah, the physical exam wasn't all that bad.

Just kidding.

Dick wanted OUT.

Ok it actually wasn't bad until it was Dr. Kurr's turn.

Dr. Quinn, while loud and somewhat annoying, was gentle and explained what she was doing before she did it. Dick liked that a lot, and she only did superficial things. Took his blood pressure, his temperature, looked down his throat and ears, although she didn't look at his eyes which was weird. She asked about any bruising or pain anywhere and Dick pointed to his thighs. She just nodded and Dr. Kurr made a note on the clipboard he had while he stood a few feet away.

But she was done all too quickly and Dr. Kurr was a lot scarier.

Dr. Kurr focused on what changed about him, and he started with his stomach, which included being rubbed for some weird medical reason. He couldn't exactly lay down so his stomach probing was done while he hiked his shirt up and exposed his middle. (The shirt was more like a glorified hospital tunic draped over his front, his back was completely exposed and the way the 'shirt' stayed on was by two strings by his neck and at his waist.) The stomach probing felt really weird and was highly uncomfortable. Dick hated it with every fiber of his being. But every time he wiggled uncomfortably Dr. Kurr shot him this look. Dick couldn't identify this look, but dread filled his entire body with this look so he tried to keep the wiggling to a minimum.

He made some notes about how his stomach felt, whatever that meant, and moved on to his wings. Dr. Kurr tended to mumble as he did these things, seemingly talking to Dick, but also to himself. Dick wanted to ignore it but sometimes there was a command in the mumbling and Dr. Kurr would get annoyed and do it himself. That's how his left wing got yanked backwards and scared Dick half to death.

His wing fought back for a moment, needing to be plastered to Dick's back protectively, but the man gave him a verbal warning and Dick forced his wing to relax. Dr. Kurr had a hand on his "wrist", he pulled and the wing straightened out, extending backwards as far as it could go while relaxed. Dick was sure he could make it go farther by using his muscles, but he didn't know what Dr. Kurr wanted. He kept mumbling incoherently, Dick was only catching wisps of what he was saying and when he did it made no sense.

Dr. Kurr proceeded to feel up his wing muscles, starting from his back and the "shoulder" there. Again Dick hated this, he grit his teeth and tightened his grip on the table to keep from crying out or shying away. The hands grabbed and pinched somewhat, moving up his joint to the "upper arm" of his wing. Dick liked that better, he could relax some, but it wasn't much better from the touching on his back so he continued to flinch. Dr. Kurr went all the way to his "wrist" before grabbing his "forearm" and making them bend like a hinge.

Dick was fully capable of doing that himself, and it felt really weird for someone else to be doing it for him, but soon enough Dr. Kurr moved on and did the same thing to his "elbow" joint. Eventually he did it to the entire wing, folding it completely before stretching it out again.

Everything paused for a few seconds, there was more mumbling and the scratch of pen on paper. Then his other wing was taken into the scientist's hands. The same process was repeated and Dick continued to be uncomfortable.

Once that was finished Dick relaxed more, the scientist must move on to some other place to terrorize. Hopefully not his eyes, he really didn't want to throw up again.