Microstory 2508: Lie Taster

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I can taste your lies, and numb your reality. Now. What does that mean? Well, the first one is obvious, but you might be surprised to learn that lies taste sweet. They actually taste really good. You might think it should be the opposite, but what you have to understand is that my ability was something that all humans possess, just to a lesser degree. We can all tell when someone’s lying, depending on how good they are at being deceptive, and how good we are at picking it up. Think about it, if someone tells a lie and it tastes bad, it’s going to be quite obvious to you, and you’re just going to reject it. Lies are meant to make you happy with something that isn’t correct, so they tasted good to me, so they would feel good. Of course, I wasn’t doing my job if I just accepted the taste, and didn’t do anything about it. It wasn’t hard either, to ignore that part, and just use it as a tool to get to the root of our subject’s issues. Only when they were honest with me could I be sure they were being honest with themselves, and only at that point could I help them not have to lie anymore. If you genuinely enjoy your job, for instance, you won’t have to lie when your boss asks if you’re happy doing it. My responsibility was to get the taste of these lies out of my head, which didn’t involve anything beyond just talking with them in a therapeutic setting. I’m the only one who almost never used my active Vulnerability gift. There just wasn’t much reason to. The best use cases were when someone was having a panic attack, and I happened to be in the room. By numbing them to their struggles, they could gain some much-needed perspective, and maybe it wouldn’t hurt so much when I brought them back to reality. It wasn’t always prudent to do this, though. I mean, they really had to be going through it at the time, and acting violent, or threatening to harm themselves or others. It was a last resort that thankfully did not come up most of the time. There is one time that I wish I had used it, and it was our last client. He could have done with a hell of a lot less emotion on that night, and we would not have ever been in danger from him. Or not. He might have used that against us as well, fueling his anger, and making him even more vindictive. There’s no way to know, but I think it all worked out, because the world has Landis now. I am enjoying being able to walk into a restaurant, and taste food, knowing that what I taste is real, and not coming from a lie coming out of someone else’s mouth.

Microstory 2299: Panic Attack

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We’re putting the finishing touches on the arrangements for the memorial service tomorrow. It’s going to be a lovely, mostly somber event. But it won’t just be all wails and cursing at the gods. We’ll be playing both of their favorite music; moreso Dutch, since he had more time to develop a taste for what this planet has to offer. I’ll be giving the eulogy, of course, and I’m really nervous about it. I’ve never spoken in front of this many people before. The publicist keeps reminding me that I already have a huge audience, because Nick managed to build one for this blog, and I’ve been posting on it exclusively for days. That’s an interesting way to frame it, and I’m trying to hold onto that. You’ve been listening to me talk for a while now, even before Nick died; it’s just that it’s been through the written word, and now you’re going to hear my real voice, and see my real face. Oh God, I think I’m having a panic attack.

All right, I’m back. That white space between paragraphs is where that panic attack happened, but I’m okay. As a medical professional, I know all the tricks, but it’s one thing to give advice to someone else, and another to follow through when you need it yourself. I closed the lid of my laptop, shut the shades, and turned off all the lights. I sat upright in the hotel bed, and focused on my breathing. Despite the darkness, I could make out enough objects in the room. I could see the television on the opposite wall; the painting hanging over the refrigerator, depicting a frozen ice skating pond with scratches on the surface, but no skaters; the faint outline of the DO NOT DISTURB sign; the luggage I had sprawled out on the other bed; and the half empty glass of water on the nightstand. No, it wasn’t half empty, but half full. I could touch the soft sheets I was sitting upon; my overheated phone that I’ve been meaning to upgrade; the highlighter that I was using while researching eulogy commonalities; and the brass gooseneck reading lamp coming from the wall above the headboard. I could hear the sound of children running in the halls while their mother tried to shush them up; the hum of the furnace; and the ticking of the analog clock by the door to the bathroom. I could smell the half eaten box of cheese crackers on the table in the corner; and something dank that I couldn’t place wafting in through the vents. I could taste the toothpaste in my mouth that I should have more thoroughly rinsed out before I sat down to write this post.

I had to take another break, which is why I’m posting this later than usual. Everything is okay, and I think I’m gonna be okay, but as the memorial approaches, it’s like it’s all happening again. I never talked about it before, and I will probably never publicly go into too much detail, but obviously, I was there when they died. I remember the lurch of the vehicle as we slid on the ice, and finally came to a stop. I remember running out of the car, and one of the security guards holding me back so I couldn’t see the wreckage. I remember seeing the wreckage anyway, and feeling the heat from the flames on my face, which felt like they were going to burn me, yet somehow still could not protect my toes from freezing under the tyranny of the snow as it seeped into my socks. I remember thinking that no one could have survived that fall, even though I was still bleary eyed, and confused. There was no hope, and now these memories are coming back, which will only make the eulogy harder to write, and even harder to give. I need a third break.

Microstory 2134: All a Big Trade-off

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I’m back home, even though I’ve not yet recovered from my infection. My lawyer argued to the judge that it was possible that the food I was given in the prison was potentially poisoned, and my distaste for it was not simply the result of another symptom of the fungus. This would be a reach, as I’m sure you’re assuming, except that this facility has a suspiciously deep history with poison. There have been other cases that were not ambiguous, and which involved guards in more than one instance. That doesn’t prove that I was indeed poisoned, because they couldn’t pinpoint anything in my body, but that was enough to get me a compassionate release. I’m obviously not completely free. I still can’t leave my apartment, and since I can’t be monitored around the clock anymore, I can’t go back to jail this weekend for my normal two-day stint. This is a complicated situation, because skipping a weekend comes with an automatic incursion of an extra 64 hours. Here’s the math. I was originally sentenced to 1000 hours. I’m scheduled to go inside at 18:00 every Friday, and come out at 18:00 on Sunday. That’s 48 hours each time. Multiply that by 20, and you get 960 hours. That means on the 21st weekend, I could have left at 10:00 on Sunday. But now I’m up to 1064 total. So it’s more than just one additional weekend. After that, I still have an extra eight hours to take care of during a 23rd weekend. And this will keep happening each time I have to push it back, even if it’s not my fault. This is just how the law works. The judge is not at liberty to make any sort of exception due to my illness. That’s probably for the best, or people would be calling in sick when they’re not, just like they do when they don’t want to go to work, or perhaps more commonly, school. My time in house arrest doesn’t count towards my quota. My time in the prison medical ward, while it was supposed to last for seven days, only covered the original 48 hours that I owed. It wasn’t supposed to last more than a week either way. It’s all a big trade-off, but I would still say that I’m glad to be back here, even with this ankle monitor. I have more space to move around, I have better internet, and I eat whatever I want. Plus, I’m still making my own hours, which gives me extra time to sleep in my nice and comfortable bed. In the prison, I found that I could only work during certain times, or the connection was excruciatingly slow. That often meant getting up in the middle of the night, and I’m not about that.

Microstory 2133: Sweet in an Alarming Way

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Though the tests suggest that I’m recovering from my infection, I just had a bizarre experience this morning. Prison food is mostly bland. I think it kind of has to be, because that type of food is easier to work with, and you don’t have to worry about people not liking the taste, because everyone hates it. I don’t love that, but it’s been easy to keep down, because that’s all they’re giving me. I’m much better at following rules when I’m being essentially forced to. When I was dieting, trying to maintain my food plan without cheating was really difficult, because I was always only truly accountable to myself. I wasn’t dating anyway, so it didn’t matter how I looked to others. Anyway, the taste was strong with my breakfast, and I can only guess that the fungus is messing with my taste buds. It was just a bran muffin with oatmeal. That’s it. The oatmeal wasn’t even heated up in milk; just water. Pretty boring, wouldn’t you say? No one loves that kind of food, even if they eat that sort of thing all the time. The first thing I noticed was the smell. I can’t really describe it to you. Because of my seasonal allergies, I never developed a good sense of smell, so I don’t have a very good frame of reference. But it was rancid. Still, I ate it, because I didn’t have options. The oatmeal had no smell at all, but it tasted sort of sweet in a really alarming way. There was no flavoring added to it. It was meant to be plain. This all reminds me of a time in college when I thought the pastries I bought had gone bad, but then I realized that I gargled some mouthwash not too long prior, so that was what was weird about it. Still, I remember worrying that the thin fibers in that chocolate chip muffin looked like spiderwebs, so I threw it out to be safe. I feel all right this time, so I don’t think it’s just that the food went bad, or that there were any spiderwebs, but I’m not a doctor. I suppose it could actually be that I was poisoned. Maybe I should be more worried about that possibility. The doctor isn’t worried about it, and just shrugged it off as a fleeting symptom, which should go away when the fungus does. In the meantime, I’m gonna keep working, staring at the wall during breaks, and occasionally hanging from the pull-up bar. That’s as much as I can do. When I was a child, I set the record for the highest number of pull-ups, but now I can’t do even one. To be fair, I’m about three times the weight, and I don’t work out anymore. At one point, I was doing gymnastics three times a week, so my life is very different now, even excluding the whole jail time thing. I refused my lunch today, because I was still freaked out and nervous, but I’m going to have to eat something soon, so I’ll let you know tomorrow if the issue has persisted.

Microstory 1650: Breathe Freely

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There are two types of voldisil in my universe; natural-born voldisil, and kenvoldisil, which are given their spirit abilities by regular voldisil. We actually say, though, that the voldisil passes on their spirit. This sort of thing doesn’t happen often, because it comes with a price. Losing one’s spirit is not like losing one’s soul. They may sound like synonyms, but it’s more like the spirit is part of one’s soul. Not everyone has one, but if they do, they can’t lose it without also losing their lives. Most of the time, when one chooses to create a kenvoldisil, it’s because they’re dying anyway, and they believe their spirit has more work to do on this Earth. They just have to hope that the person they choose is worthy, and will use the abilities wisely. Landis Tipton is one such kenvoldisil, but he did not just receive one spirit; he received five, and not because he was deemed worthy, but because he was the only choice. Five voldisil friends were all attacked by a powerful and angry sixth voldisil, and they knew that their time was up. They ran off, looking for a new group of five to take up the mantle. Unfortunately, it was a late hour, and they were in a sparsely populated part of town, so they only managed to find Landis. Still, they had to do something, so with their final breaths, they drove their spirits into him. They didn’t even have time to explain to him what they were, what he now was, and what he was meant to do with his new gifts. Separately, the abilities had many great uses. They were fit for a team looking to do some good. Combined, the applications were less useful, so he really just focused on one. Landis now had the ability to see someone’s regrets, smell their health, hear their desires, feel their pain, and taste their lies.

Without a team, Landis didn’t know what he was supposed to do with his life now. Should he become a therapist, and help people overcome their problems by knowing their regrets and desires? Could he become a human lie detector, helping the authorities catch criminals? Or should he diagnose medical conditions, and relay that information to medical professionals? Well, what he realized was that the original five voldisil probably weren’t using their spirit gifts in the best way possible. They were helping one person—or maybe one small group—at a time. He wasn’t even sure whether they knew that their abilities could be reversed. When he looked at someone, he could witness events of their past that they wished never happened, but when they looked into his eyes, he could show them their potential. Their voice could tell him what they want, while his voice could comfort them, and make them feel satisfied with their lives. He could sense pain, and take it away with touch. He could taste lies, but also force them to tell the truth. But the most important ability he now possessed was the only one he ended up really using. His nose could detect health, but his breath could heal. Once he discovered this, everything changed. He sat down, and made a plan, and then he carried out that plan exquisitely. He first approached the wealthiest man in the city who was publicly known to be presently having health issues. He made a deal. Give Landis a thousand dollars right now on the chance that Landis could heal him, and then the rest of the million dollars once the oncologist told him he was cured. Of course, the man was hesitant, but a thousand bucks was nothing to him, and he had tried everything else, so he might as well give it a shot.

A few weeks later, Landis was a millionaire. He didn’t just spend the money on fast cars, and small-portion food, though. He asked the man to reach out to his other sick, but rich, friends, and got himself a few more million dollars, and then Landis bought a hotel. He cleared out all the guests, hired a growing team, and started a foundation. He brought in people one by one. They literally stood in line, and waited their turn to be healed. He didn’t always charge them, though. Much of the pre-work that needed to be done involved looking over every patient’s finances to determine which category they fit into. The rich people paid, the less rich people didn’t pay anything, and poor people actually received money. It was just free money that Landis gave them, along with the cure for what ailed them, from an account that was funded by the wealthiest of patients. As word spread, the operation was able to expand. A security team maintained order in the ballroom. A video played in the entertainment room, explaining to people what they were here for, and why it worked the way it worked. Just about all his staff members lived in the hotel, which was why he chose it in the first place, instead of a gymnasium, or something. It was a complicated, and extremely efficient program, which served to cure literally millions of people over the course of several years. He didn’t do much but work. Someone came into the room, he breathed on them, and then they left to make room for the next one. He worked for about ten hours every day, stopping only to use the restroom, and eat. In the evening, he had a nice dinner, enjoyed an hour-long massage, then started his nightshift, which was... Well, it was different. Let’s just say that certain women were...interested in...seeing if his abilities could be...passed onto a new generation. Landis took this part of his job seriously, and was doing it for all the right reasons, but he didn’t apologize for not hating it, nor for screening the candidates personally. In the end, Landis saved billions of lives once researchers were able to replicate his healing abilities—and only his healing abilities—for mass production. He was inarguably the most important voldisil in our history.