Episode XI

“Are you all right, mister? You look pale.”

“I have an exotic tropical disease and I’ve got six weeks to live, but other than that I’m fine.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to—”

“Save it. I don’t want your pity; I just want a hotel room.”

James Faulkner collected his key from the woman at the front desk, carried his bags to his room, changed his clothes and headed down to the spa. As he settled down into the water, he decided that the decision to come to Acid Resort had been a good one. If I’m going to die in six weeks, I might as well enjoy the time I’ve got left, he thought. The doctors would have preferred that he remain close to a hospital where they could keep doing experiments and running tests, but they’d been at it for nearly a year with no results. His condition had continued to deteriorate, and they’d made no significant progress.

Faulkner’s Disease. That’s what it would be called, since his was apparently the first case. It was a viral infection he’d picked up in South America. It defied all assaults by modern medicine, while gradually attacking his nervous system. The seizures were happening frequently now, although they never lasted long. The doctors predicted that the synaptic damage would become fatal in six weeks at the most. There was really nothing they could do for him, and he had no desire to spend his last days as a science experiment. Aside from the epilepsy, the only symptom he actually felt was tiredness in his muscles; there was no need at this point to be hospitalized.

That evening, after a lobster dinner, Faulkner took a walk outside, looking at the various sulfur springs which were rivaled only by the ones in Yellowstone. Some of them had signs warning tourists to stay away from the water; it was boiling hot and highly acidic. He was standing in front of one of these, admiring the bright green and blue colors in the pool and wondering how deep the underwater cave went, when he had a particularly severe epileptic seizure. For about three minutes he had no voluntary motor control, and was unable to avoid the water. When the fit was over, he had third-degree burns all over his left arm. So much for avoiding hospitals.

The next morning, he woke up in his hospital bed and noticed something extraordinary. His arm was covered in burns and hurt to touch – no surprise there – but beneath the surface wounds he could feel strength returning to his muscles. The contrast was plain as day; the weakness and sluggishness that he felt when he moved his right arm was not there in his left. I’ve found a cure, he thought. That pool can heal me! This thought was interrupted by another seizure, much more violent and prolonged than any he had previously experienced.

“Your condition has deteriorated more rapidly than anyone anticipated,” a doctor explained. “The seizures are happening two or three times an hour. We have to continue to keep you here for your own protection.”

“Doctor, I have a cure,” he tried to explain. “My left arm doesn’t feel tired anymore! The sulfur pool at Acid Resort can heal me.”

“There’s no way boiling water could help your condition,” the doctor said.

“But my arm feels better!”

“It’s probably a result of nerve damage.”

“Can you at least do a test of some kind to see?”

“I can run another set of blood tests if you like.”

“Please.”

Faulkner didn’t know if the blood tests would reveal anything, and he didn’t care. He knew that he had to get to the miraculous pool before it was too late. He waited until the middle of the night before sneaking out of the hospital and making his way through the dark streets of Daze Springs and out to the resort. It was slow going with seizures every few minutes.

Even in the moonlight, he could see the beautiful colors beneath the water. This is going to hurt, he thought. But it will save me. He removed the hospital gown, stepped close to the edge of the pool, and dived in. Pain wracked his body in blinding waves until he passed out.

Back at the hospital, the doctor was surprised by the results of the blood test he had ordered to pacify his delusional patient. In addition to the Faulkner Virus, the blood held traces of a second virus which did not match anything on file, but which would eventually be called the Acid Virus, for its native habitat. There was evidence that the two kinds of microbes interacted with one another in unusual ways; this might account for the change in symptoms the patient had reported. Before the doctor had time to speculate further, he was informed that the patient was missing.

When Faulkner woke up the next morning, he panicked for a moment when he realized he was underwater, then calmed down when he realized he was not drowning. He couldn’t breath, per se, but he could feel oxygen entering his system through his gills. Strange, he thought. I don’t remember having gills. He didn’t remember having that spiky thing on his left arm, either. And he did remember having hair. This was going to take some getting used to.

A bit of exploration revealed that he was in a deep underwater cave, the entrance to which was the pool he had dived in. He swam to the surface and poked his head out into the air, which he discovered that his lungs could still breath. A small child ran away screaming. He dived back out of sight before her parents could see him. So, I’m still alive, he thought. But I’m a freak of nature. I can never return to human society. If only that idiot doctor had believed me! I wonder what this spiky thing does.