Growing Pains

Disclaimer:

This story is the sickest, most twisted, repulsive, and nauseating mind-fuck that you will ever read. It will force you to ask you lots of questions, but give you very few answers. Proceed at your own risk. I'm not kidding! You have been warned!



Kimberly tried her best to hide the bitter, poisonous contempt she felt towards her supervising doctor--and managed to do so quite well with a sweet smile as she handed her a folder. Dr. Faye nodded with a smile as she took the file, though didn't bother to look at it. "Have a good night, Dr. Possible. I'll be seeing you shortly, I hope," she said with a soft grin.

"Good night, Dr. Faye. You most definitely will!" Kim said defiantly.

Before turning to leave, though, she noticed someone else in the room, "Oh, um... hi Dr. Leroux. How are you?" she asked a lady with shoulder-length curly blond hair.

"Quite well, Dr. Possible. How do you do?" she replied in a French accent.

"I'm alright. Though do forgive me, I must get going."

"Of course. Good night," she said with a smile. Kim thought it was strange for a gynecologist to be sitting in a neurologist's office, but this wasn't the first time she had seen her there, so she didn't think much of it.

"Why are you so hard on her? Is it amusing to push her buttons, Aida?" the lady doctor with the French accent asked.

"You misunderstand me, Angelique. I'm hard on her because she needs it. She thrives on it. Without it, she'll begin to atrophy," replied Aida Faye.

"Is that all that it is?" asked Angelique as she walked up to Aida's chair from behind, and wrapped her arms across her shoulders.

Aida laughed, "Are you jealous?" she asked, looking up.

Angelique giggled as she pinched one of Aida's cheeks, "You wish!" She smiled as she pondered something for a moment and a thought occurred to her, "She reminds you of someone you know, doesn't she? Another young, bright-eyed doctor with a dual specialty of neurology and psychiatry... N'es pas?"

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"Aaargh!" Kim growled as she was talking to another resident. No one had been able to replace Monique, but she had found new friends in medical school.

"She's such a bitch! I can't stand her..." Kim said angrily, resisting the urge to punch the wall of her dorm room.

"Wait... so, let me get this straight. She offered you Xyrem?" asked Grace, her roomie.

"Yes! Can you blieve it? The nerve of that woman..."

"Are you kidding me? I'd kill to get my hands on it!"

Kim blinked, looking at Grace critically. "What!? It's a drug. That's not a healthy attitude for a doctor to have..."

Grace shook her head, "You don't understand. Xyrem isn't a downer. It's the holy grail of all hynotics. It--"

"I know," said Kim, cutting her off, "improves sleep quality and increases after-sleep alertness. But it's a drug meant to treat a disease."

"Well," replied Grace, "caffeine is used to prevent SIDS in premature infants. And yet, you use it to cope with sleep-deprivation, don't you?"

"Yeah, but!" Kim replied with instant indignation, "Coffee is natural!"

Grace answered calmly, "Caffeine is a methylxanthine used by plants as an insecticide. In fact, xanthines are toxic to most animal species kept as pets. We humans are the stange ones: not only can we tolerate these alkaloids, but we actually enjoy them."

Kim opened her mouth, but Grace continued firmly, "And furthermore, caffeine is a xenobiotic. Meaning, a substance foreign to the body. Xyrem contains oxybate, otherwise known as gamma-hydroxybutyrate: a normal byproduct of metabolism. So Xyrem is, in fact, more 'natural' than your morning brew."

Kim rolled her eyes. "Right. But. Our bodies contain only tiny traces of gamma-hydroxybutyrate at any one time. In the amounts used as a drug, it can be dangerous and addictive. In this country, it's a controlled substance!"

Grace answered, "In this country, tobacco and alcohol are prefectly legal for someone of age. They are also entirely natural. While they may have some limited medical use, I don't think you'd say that they ought to have widespread availability. And I think you would also agree that they are extremely dangerous and addictive. In this country, we tried to ban alcohol. And failed. Why do you think that is? Because 'right' and 'wrong,' 'good' and 'bad' are just words defined by society. The law, at least at present, has little in accord with scientific evidence, or even basic logic," she said, adjusting her glasses.

Now Kim was at a loss for words. She tried to think of something to say, but couldn't come up with anything. She yawned softly, "Hmm... good night," she said in defeat as she lay down and turned off her bedside lamp. Though she didn't immediately drift off to sleep.

Some people said that little Kimmie was just following in mommy's footsteps, perhaps trying to outshine her by taking dual specialties at once. But that's what people do--talk and whisper. The truth was, human behavior is something that had always fascinated Kim. However, she wanted to study something more scientific than psychology; being the daughter of two scientists, that discipline seemed to be the perfect example of a pseudoscience. However, even psychiatry was something that seemed like a sophisticated crapshoot: let's just try and see what works. She wondered if it was possible to be able to understand the root cause of mental illnesses, and choose treatments that were appropriate to the individual patient.

That was why she had entered medical school. But nothing could have prepared her for the rigour required. Not even her years of crime-fighting, trying to juggle school, cheerleading, and saving the world. Getting to the end of every shift seemed like a victory and a minor miracle. After "retiring" from crime-fighting after high school, looking back at it, undergrad seemed like a breeze. But this was a whole new level of intensity. She was usually assigned the most difficult cases. Being the dual specialist, she had to deal with patients who presented with behavioral disturbances, co-morbid with neurological disease. There were no straightforward answers. Every case seemed like something the world had never seen before, and no textbook had the answer. Each one a puzzle, where the diagnosis and treatment were a challenge.

Although the responsibility of diagnosis and treatment didn't rest solely with her--she usually worked as part of a team, with least one senior doctor--even coming up with an opinion or an idea was like climbing Everest without supplemental oxygen. Someone used to getting straight A's had never yet come up with the "right" answer, which was incredibly frustrating. So far, all she had gotten were challenges, but very few rewards and very little job satisfaction. She began to wonder if she had made the right career choice. At times, she even asked herself if she had bitten off more than she could chew.

But that was against her fiery, red-headed nature! She could never live it down if she ever accepted defeat; she never had, and she wasn't about to start now. And this wasn't just another battle against Drakken or Monkey Fist--this was the most important fight of her life. The outcome would shape the rest of her life. Compared to how long she had lived, the rest of her life seemed like a pretty long, long time. She had been knocked down again, and again, and again--more times than she could count. She had lost every battle so far, but she wasn't about to forfeit the war. She had worked too hard already to throw it all away.

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Kim was watching a movie. No, it wasn't quite a movie. It was like being right there. She could smell things. You can't smell things in a movie. It was strange, because she could feel the emotions of the characters, and even know things going on simultaneously. She couldn't quite see herself, but none of these strange things bothered her. Right now, she was focused on the scene in front of her.

It was probably somewhere in West Africa: it was very hot and humid, and almost everyone present was black. A wedding seemed to be going on. The mood was joyous and festive. There was lots of meat, fruits, and food in general, along with a beer brewed from millet which everyone was drinking in copious amounts. It was hard to tell what time period it was, but it seemed to have little relevance. A group of people had gathered for a happy occasion. The bride seemed especially happy. She had been looking forward to this day since her childhood and today, she couldn't stop smiling: she was finally a wife, and her dreams of becoming a mother were so close to fulfillment.

Then, almost out of the blue, there was a loud noise. Gun shots, followed by shouting and screaming. In a single moment, everything had turned to chaos as the guests started to run. They were being chased by a group of men, a few of them white, but most of them black, wearing what appeared to be eighteenth-century European attire. Those who were unlucky enough were quickly bound up and marched out of the village to the port. Anyone who tried to break formation was instantly shot. It wasn't long before they were all doing as they were told. To her dread, Kim saw the bride amongst those who had been captured.

If they weren't people, Kim might have described what she saw as an animal market. A large mass of people in two enclosure, where the men and women were separated. When the bride saw her new husband being taken away, she started to scream, tears straming down her face as she flailed and resisted, reaching out with her arms, trying to embrace him at least one last time. But they didn't shoot her. They kicked, punched, and beat her, pushing her into the encolusre where women were kept. She had just crossed the gate of no return.

"Set sail for Jamaica," said a middle-aged man with long red hair held in a loose ponytail. He looked awfully familiar.

"Aye aye, Captain Watson. Plotting course from Goree to Jamaica," replied the man who was apparently the navigator.

Over the next few weeks, Kim was witness to everything that happened on the ship. The slaves were kept chained in the lower decks, barely allowed to move. They were punished harshly for the slightest misdeeds, whipped and beaten until they passed. Sometimes, they were punished for no reason at all, until they actually died and were thrown overboard. At other times, some of them were chosen randomly for executions; blindfolded and shot. Then there were the rapes.

Some of the women, the prettier ones (the sailors would never admit that--from the way they spoke, they didn't even consider them human) were chosen to relieve the lusts of the men. In another series of misfortunes to fall upon the bride, she became the target of this violence. In a few weeks, her abdomen started to swell. And yet, she seemed to cheer up a little. She hadn't planned it this way, and she didn't know who the father was, but it seemed that she would become a mother, after all.

In her earlier days as a student doctor, she had seen this earlier: when some women became pregnant, their mood would lift. However, Kim was gravely concerned because the new mother was underfed. The meager portions of rice and beans couldn't provide enough protein, fat, or even calories--let alone micronutrients to sustain a pregnancy. Further, the men couldn't tolerate proof that they had rutted with an animal. They repeatedly kicked and beat her in the abdomen every day, until one night, the inevitable happened.

The mother-to-be screamed in agony, blood running down between her legs. It was early, much too early for her to be in labor. Yet, even in this tragedy, there was no one there to help her. The men and women slaves just stared, their eyes resembling those of the dead, sitting and standing in catatonia. By morning time, she was silent. Over the next few days, it became apparent that she had lost the will to live. She refused to eat even her meager rations, take water, or even care for herself.

"Captain, I'm afraid I have some bad news," said one of the men.

"What is it, Officer?" asked the Captain.

"It appears that more of our cargo has survived than we had anticipated."

"And..?"

"Well, sir, we will be fined at the port for being over the weight limit."

"Then discard some of the cargo to lower the poundage."

"But... we can't afford to waste more bullets..."

"Then don't bother with the bullets! Are you daft, man? Asking silly questions..."

Kim couldn't believe what she was hearing! Just as the order had been given out, the weakest among the human cargo were rounded up, and thrown overboard to drown alive.

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Kim screamed as she sat up in bed, and vomited. She quickly got up and ran to the bathroom, screaming as tears ran down her cheeks. She vomited again and again until her stomach was empty, but she continued to have dry heaves. The contractions of her esophagus and abdomen put pressure on her vagus nerve, which caused her to faint. She hit her head as she collapsed on the floor. Hey body convulsed on the floor as she started to have a generalized tonic-clonic siezure.