"Do you think that 'treatment with recovery mirrors' is really useful? Why do I feel that the patients' conditions are getting weirder and weirder?" Hedy held Tabitha's arm as they walked forward. She kept blabbering about the hospital and the other nurses, but Tabitha only noticed the "treatment of recovery mirrors" that Hedy mentioned.
"Treatment...?"
"Yeah, the one that Dr. Mile figured out. It takes in a patient's negative state through the mirror and restores them to their original state. If I recall correctly, your patient had also signed up for this experimental treatment, right? In my opinion, such treatment is no different from voodoo! I mean there's no hospital in the world, which would use a treatment like this... Ah, I should have never listened to my parents… Why did I come here?"
"How could the government allow them to use such unorthodox treatment…"
Tabitha stopped involuntarily. If she remembered correctly, the medical report that Alfred had mentioned "the trial of recovery mirrors." So not only had the human experimentation been successful, it had even been formally adopted. What was going on now? She was under the idea that she had returned to a time when the hospital was experimenting secretly. She even conjectured that the hospital's abandonment was caused by the failure of the human experiments. But the things happening in front of her that very moment told her that she was completely wrong!
"Who knows! 'The powers that be have their own tricks, but that has nothing to do with nurses like us. Finding a gentleman and getting married to him, so as to get away from this hospital is my only wish."
The expression on the young nurse's face looked pretty sad. She went to the ward with Tabitha in tow. Tabitha was racking her brains over her current situation that she didn't notice that she had already been dragged into Ward 6.
When Hedy stopped walking and bowed, Tabitha was still deep in thought. She didn't notice the man in front of her until the young nurse tugged her sleeve. The man was in a white coat. He was about forty-years-old and wore a circular monocle on his left eye with gold chains hanging down from his ear. He looked mature but aloof.
Only when Tabitha saw the nametag on the white coat did she greet him hesitantly. She never imagined that she would meet Dr. Mile so soon. Recalling how Sasha and Hedy mentioned and acted in front of Dr. Mile, she suddenly felt that her greeting was way too casual… If he punished her because of her attitude… God knows what a person like him, a doctor who uses his patients for human experiments, would do to her!
Tabitha kept telling herself to calm down, and when she looked at Dr. Mile again, she tried to give a sycophantic look but the doctor remained indifferent. He held a record in his hand and asked: "Is Mr. Brown under your charge?"
The girl opened her mouth, unsure how to answer. She did not even know who Mr. Brown was!
"Yes… Dr. Mile."
Forget it, she had no choice but to say yes.
"I instructed that his blood is to be released twice a day but you only did it once yesterday. As for the mercury dosage, you also made a mistake two days ago. Look at Mr. Brown. Do you not feel guilty about your oversight at all? Do you even care about our patients?"
The doctor appeared to pity Tabitha for her mistakes. The young girl couldn't give an answer when faced with his reproach. She was quite shocked by Dr. Mile's attitude. She thought of him as a cold-blooded science geek but now, she was unsure if her guesses were right. He did not seem like he was planning on punishing her despite her having made so many mistakes…
"I know you're still young. Seventeen, right? Go to the clean room after the tour tonight to repent for half an hour. Don't make mistakes again. Mr. Brown's wife trusts us. You don't want three kids to lose their father right?"
Dr. Mile left the room after he handed the record back to Tabitha. The girl hadn't figured out what was going on, and Hedy had already approached the patient. When she passed Tabitha, she paused but said nothing.
Tabitha held the record in her hand, wanting to ask about the clean room but obviously, Hedy was unwilling to talk about it. And being "Tabitha D.," a nurse in the hospital, she should have known what and where the clean room was. Realizing that she was in a quagmire, she simply stopped thinking about it and went to the seriously ill Mr. Brown.
Mr. Brown was wrapped in a thin white quilt. He had sallow skin and cheeks. When the girl carefully lifted his arm out from the quilt, he slowly opened his eyes.
"Good morning, Tabitha. Hope I didn't cause you any trouble because of my capriciousness. Sometimes I just feel it's too much for me to undergo this treatment." The man's voice was weak and his attitude was mild.
Tabitha was not sure what it was like to go to the clean room but faced with such a weak patient, she couldn't really say anything about him troubling her. She shook her head and looked at the things on her trolley. She was ultimately not a real nurse so she was unsure what she needed to as she looked at the huge pile of equipment.
"Well, let's take your temperature first, Mr. Brown."
The girl kept taking out various things and putting them. This continued for a long time before finally, she felt redeemed seeing the mercury thermometer. In any case, there was no wrong in taking a patient's temperature.
Mr. Brown nodded without doubting her and allowed Tabitha to put the thermometer under his tongue. A moment later, she took out the thermometer. Her fingers trembled when she saw the temperature, causing the mercury thermometer to fall on the tiled floor. With a light crack, a small pool of pearl-colored liquid stained the floor.
Tabitha quickly took a towel to clean up the shattered glass and mercury. The 20°C she saw on the thermometer kept appearing in her mind. A normal person's body temperature was 37°C. Even 35°C was too low for a living person. How could a patient suffer from such a strange body temperature of 20°C? She threw the broken thermometer into a medical waste bucket along with the stained towel. She did not dare return to the ward. She was completely lost.
The world she was in did not follow her idea of logic at all. Everyone was ordinary but somehow she felt that they were not as normal as they seemed. Even the young nurse Hedy was kind of weird.
"Excuse me, do you know where Dr. Mile is?"
A person suddenly tapped her on the shoulder. Tabitha jumped in fright as she turned around. A well-dressed lady had asked her the question.
"Dr. Mile…" She tried to calm her racing heart. "He should be in the director's office."
"I see. Thank you." The lady smiled and thanked her. After that, she headed for the stairs. Tabitha pondered over what had previously happened to her. Suddenly, she recalled that the woman looked healthy and rich. She had to be one of the hospital's investors or the family member of a patient. If she followed her, she might learn something she didn't know. After all, there was nothing she could do if she returned to the ward. Instead of wasting her time with Mr. Brown, trying to figure out the secrets of the hospital was more important. She needed to find a way to return to the time when the hospital had been abandoned.
After making up her mind, she looked up and down; making sure that no one had noticed her. She gingerly climbed the stairs to the third floor like a cat.
The hospital was huge but its layout was weird. Tabitha followed the signboards but somehow got lost on the third floor. According to the signboards, she should have found the director's office on the left. However, the entire hospital was built like a maze. Every corner had the same mirrors and corridors, completely identical to the one she came from, eighty years into the future.
Despite circling the area twice, she failed to find the office. Worst of all, she couldn't even find the staircase she had taken to reach where she was. Tabitha leaned against the wall, frustrated. She had no idea where she should go. And at that moment, a man approached her with a scalpel in hand. His expression was strange and he looked soulless.
The girl stepped back, her throat tingling. Her hand reached out. She got ready to run if the man attacked her. To her horror, the man only stared at her for a while, before swiping horizontal across his neck with the scalpel! Blood gushed out as the man fell to the ground. However, he remained staring at her. His scalpel was lying beside him. The distance between the Tabitha and this man was only about two to three meters. The blood kept splattering on Tabitha's face, turning cold upon contact with her skin.