THE MOMENT
Steven was human again, and sleeping at last. He’d had a rough night of body aches, chills, fever, and anxious energy making him want to do SOMETHING, anything to put his jitters to use. The worse it got, the more he changed, and a close friend finally convinced him he should visit the hospital because he was cursed. His skin was nearly glowing electric blue by the time he walked into the emergency room. And he still had to wait.
People believed that magic and curses were common in the world, but he wasn’t one of them. He even laughed the first time he heard about Witchdoctors being medically recognized and positioned at hospitals. But it was hard to argue with results. If it was all placebo, then he was okay with that. The only thing he knew for sure was that when the M.W., Medical Witchdoctor, began chanting over him, Steven’s own body started to glow with purple light, and he felt instantly soothed.
“It’s getting worse.” Ellienna Woodmeyer, the Chief of Medicine, was standing outside Steven’s window, with a purple-haired young woman in an overly elaborate nurse’s uniform. They couldn’t risk giving him a normal room and instead let him rest in one of the reinforced and secured cells they used for dangerous patients. “If he’d waited any longer… or if our M.W.s couldn’t dispel the cursed energy, it would’ve taken root and corrupted him beyond anything that could ever be recovered from.”
“I don’t suppose it’s as simple as too much cursed energy and they just die, right?” Ida asked. Dr. Woodmeyer shook her head.
“Whatever that magic is, it enjoys having a vessel,” she said. “We can’t predict exactly what’ll happen, but it’s not entirely a disservice to describe the end result as a ferocious wild beast with unparalleled innate magical ability. His eyes were almost pink. We have to assume it’s going to start happening and prepare accordingly.”
“I believe you’re right,” Ida nodded. She could see Steven’s aura, and it was scarred. Most humans had gentle purple auras, but his was splotched with dark blobs of dull rainbow light. If it were a tapestry, the discolorations resembled bleach stains eating away the natural color and revealing the dull reality underneath. She had no idea how it would affect him, but she was positive something like that had to affect its victims. “I’ll bring it up to Bijou,” she said.
“Oh, great,” Dr. Woodmeyer laughed and shook her head.
“What?” Ida asked. “You wanted help, right? That’s why you called me here?” Ida was a special concierge between the hospitals and Sharp Development leadership. But, Sharp Development owned a lot of hospitals, so it had to be something big to get Ida there as soon as the same day.
“Yes, of course,” Dr. Woodmeyer replied. “I’m just not looking forward to the escalation that’s going to be required,” she answered. Dr. Woodmeyer was good at her job, and she’d had a long career working for Sharp Development. She could already see the direction this ailment was going, and she had a guess as to how they’d respond.
“After people started showing up to the hospital with curses, hospitals now have at least one witch doctor on staff. That took some time to get society used to it, but here we are now with M.W. positions at most medical institutions. But now that it’s getting worse…,” she sighed with amusement. “If Medical Witchdoctors aren’t enough, we’re going to have to start staffing Medical Magical Girls, aren’t we?”
“Oh, it’ll be fine,” Ida nodded with a smirk. “People love them. And, they’re much easier to find than Witchdoctors.”