VirileMail/8

MRI
Dr. Klein came into the room. "Well, Joe, you gave me a real scare. Do you have a history of seizures? You did not indicate it on the form when you made your appointment."

I'm not sure if I had fallen asleep again. It took me a moment to become alert and remember who this ranting woman was. Dr. Klein, of course! "No, I do not have seizures," I replied.

She asked, "Do you remember in my office? Do you remember when you stopped talking? I think that was a seizure."

I replied, "Yes, I remember, but I don't think it was a seizure."

She smiled, "Well, that is why we are going to do some tests, so we can figure out exactly what happened."

I was tempted to ask if she was working for the aliens, but she was speaking again, very fast. "I've arranged for a brain scan. We'll look for the case of your seizure. In these cases, be can often see a little bit of abnormal tissue that is the source of the problem."

An orderly arrived and soon they had me rolling down the hall in my bed. It sure looked like the hall of hospital, but I was watching closely for aliens. In just a few minutes they had me positioned in a huge Magnetic Resonance scanning device. I could hear Dr. Klein's voice, "Okay, we just got a baseline scan. It looks normal. Now I want you to do what you did before when you had the seizure. Do you remember?"

I knew what she was talking about. I had tried to tell her about the aliens, but then they had clamped down on my brain, not wanting me to tell anyone about my discovery that Earth was being invaded by aliens. I tried to talk about the aliens, but once again I could not say the words! I was getting frustrated but then I heard Dr. Klein's voice again, "Wow, that's amazing! We just got huge spike in brain activity. Oh, my, I've never seen a pattern quite like this. Let's try..." But that was the last I could remember hearing.

I woke up again and I barely remembered me trying to think about aliens. I only recalled hearing something about a huge spike or something. I went to the bathroom and I felt very weak when I got up. In few minutes, the same nurse came again.

“Hi, Mr. Joe. I see you are better. During the MRI scan you got an attack. Dr. Klein thinks there are some difficult thoughts you cannot stand.”

“I would like to talk to her” I said.

“You can't do it now. She has gone to your company to find out about your job. She thinks there is something strange about that project with a strange name...”

“Right. OK, then I will wait”

“Yes, you have to rest. As soon as you need any help don't forget to ring here and I will come as soon as I can.”

“Thanks”

Everything was normal now. I had recovered a little and it seemed like a real hospital with real nurses. But I could not trust anyone yet.

Chloe visit
The next day Dr. Klein went to do some neurological tests on me. She said that I was hyper reflective or something but that I was fine. She asked me if I remembered about my work, my co-workers, my relatives, everything. She told me that she thought that I could be out of there soon. And Wanda also brought me good news. Chloe would visit me; as soon as she knew about me, she decided she would go to the hospital. So, I was not inside a UFO, after all. Anyway, I did not mention that, because I felt some sweating when thinking about that. UFOs or aliens were thoughts that could struck me with a seizure, like the doctor said. Of course she did not know which were those thoughts, maybe she did not remember about me saying that in my first attack. After that, Dr. Klein left me.

I passed all day wandering about my situation. I was very careful not to think about aliens or something related, not even the project. I was just killing time awaiting for Chloe. I really want to see her, to be able to talk to someone who could understand me more than the doctor. It was strange, but Wanda did not comment anything about the project or Antler Network Systems. Maybe she did not want me to remind about it, waiting for me to be completely cured first.

A quarter past three Chloe came in.

“Hi, Joe. I am glad to see you. I hope you are better. Wanda has told me everything you passed through” she said.

“Fine. Yes, I have been a little strange these past days. I am happy to see you too. And I think I am better, even Wanda told me I was. I just hope to be able to leave soon...”

“Yes. But you should not go to work immediately. You need to recover first.”

“Of course”, I thought, the aliens do not want me there yet.

“Of course. But I am suffering from my computer addiction. I really want to use one, at least to browse the web.”

“The doctor told me you are not ready yet. She will do more tests on you until you finally recover. Just try to relax and not to think about work yet.”

“About that, what are you doing?”

“No. I said to Wanda that I would not talk about that...”

“Please, I want to know. Being here looking around is no fun, believe me. I have to think about something.”

“Well. Just don't get stressed by anything. Wanda told me that something related to the project made you suffer a strike, no, a seizure is the word she used. So tell me if you feel bad”

“I will.”

“OK. Well, we are trying to implement those Lockback chips. You have been needed a lot in there. But we have managed to do it without you. Brian and I are doing tons of work to replace you. The rest is the same, nothing new in particular. Besides those unbelievable chips, the project is the same.”

“Right. Aren't you working in excess?”

“The same as always. The same you did when you were there.”

“That's my point. Chloe, don't you remember that we never were so prolific?”

“No. We have always been computer addicts.”

“Not to that extent. By the way, did you remember what we discover in the router table?”

“Which table? The last thing we did was to look for an Internet signal. No, I don't remember anything. Maybe you just invented something while being here.”

“No, I am not that cra... sick. We discovered that Janek was not receiving the e-mails; the server was the receiver of the messages. The server did all the translations from that bizarre language!”

“What? When did we find out about that? No, never!”

“Yes, we did. I even had a videotape I wanted to show you. We talked about this on our 'date'”

“I remember you told me something about a videotape but I don't remember it was that. Anyway, you had filmed something, but I don't remember what was that. I think you better rest and try to sleep a little. I have to go.”

“Wait! I want you to...” I said

“What?”

“Destroy the... oh, no...”

And I went unconscious again.

When I woke up again, Chloe was not there. Only the nurse were near me. She greeted me and put some drug into my serum. Then she went out saying something about the ring, again. I realized about my situation. There was no way for me to fight against them, whatever they were. When I was going to say something related to VirileMail I simply lost my conscience. What I was going to say to Chloe was that she should destroy the server, killing Janek AI or whatever it was. But I could not do it. I had to find a way to kill them, if they were alive. Maybe they were aliens or maybe they were just an AI project invented by the Czech. I could not know. But what I could be sure was that all of us were brain washed in some way. Chloe could not remember about the router. Brian had memory losses too, not even remembering the Eggplant, for instance. And I had stopped having memory losses, did I?, but I could not communicate nothing contrary to the aliens' plans. So, the threat was real, it had to be.

Janek's e-mail
To be continued…