Riftborn Lasirus
Nyarlathotep
ADULT CONTENT WARNING
Don't read if you're sensitive to topics regarding cancer, pregnancy, or failed pregnancy.
The Death of Death: Regarding Yion
She had beautiful eyes like a gemstone. Amber shine that could take your breath away.
That was the first feature I noticed of her. The woman who fell into my care–taken under my own wing. Abnormal as it was for myself to treat such an older patient, she had come to me under desperation. She was, for lack of a better term:
Hard to ignore.
I do not fancy myself a romantic, nor do I believe in the world of childish whimsy. Imaginative realms where all your dreams come true and that prince charming is destined to come. The belief in 'the one' I thought I knew, but a relationship is as delicate as surgery. One mishap and the malpractice damages that very delicate artery we call 'love.'
I had this accident when I was young.
I lost my child to a bum ovary.
Yet just when I believed that path towards my own "happy ending" had perished before the war (and how fitting), she would enter my life.
And she would say to me:
"Mister Cho…"
"I want to live."
We doctors are scientists of fickle fantasies. We are nature's nightmare, we are society's Frankenstein. What drives us to tweak and 'fix' the wrong in our bodies is our insatiable desire to conquer life itself.
In other words, we are the ones who fear death the most.
She wasn't the first to view me as a miracle worker. I have been through that same song and dance countless times. I have seen the lifeless eyes of all those I promised to treat and failed. To say I tried is a dishonor. We doctor's do not 'try.' We either succeed, or we fail.
And at the end of the day, we never truly succeed at all.
For we all die.
But she did not want to.
"I don't treat adults." But she did not listen to me.
"Oh doctor, you've done miracles on these children!"
"They are not miracles."
"Then you have a talent, one the other doctors don't have. Please."
She always said that.
"Please."
"Ma'am—"
"Please."
I remember that silence. I remember her stance. She had clasped her hands together and looked me dead in the eyes. I felt like I was put on the spot, but she would speak again.
"I have no one else to turn to, Mister Cho. I beg, what they say about you, it sounds like you're a walking miracle. I need that, doctor. I need you."
And then, she would tell me something fascinating. The turn of events I wasn't expecting. To say that it didn't sway me would be a lie.
"My child needs you."
I have gone through hell and back, but I will say...the eyes of a determined mother can send a chill down anyone's spine. That spotlight I had felt all made sense to me then. This woman was speaking to me as two.
At first, I had thought that she was a single parent that God decided to play a dirty hand to. A cancer victim whose treatment never gave satisfying results, but the determination of a mother meets no bounds. Instead of letting her life rot away in the hands of another, she took the risk to seek me out, all for the sake of her child.
"Your child? I see, so you've come to me to assure that your kid doesn't grow up without a—"
"My child is still unborn."
Excuse me?
"I want to see him...I want to make sure he lives…" she had begged.
It was that moment I sat there. Silence that was almost deafening. The only note I heard was the ticking of the clock as I stared back at her, and she stared back at me.
It...reminded me of the look in ▇▇▇ her eyes ▇▇▇ that day. So virgin and arrogant to advance and become a parent. Become a mother. She was denied that status, it was stripped from her. As if she had taken a bite of the forbidden fruit and this was her punishment. Her body broken, yet the grieving remained.
I had lost my child that day. In some case, I could also say that I had lost ▇▇▇▇▇▇ her, as well. Her denial closed her off from the world, as I closed her off from myself.
How I wanted so much to hold that baby.
"You're pregnant?" I recall muttering, her ears picked it up.
"He's still healthy, they've seen nothing wrong with him, doctor. He still has a chance. It's me they've given up on."
...If there was anything I could do to assure this fate didn't befall this woman, as well. Well...I do not believe in miracles,
but I was prepared to perform one.
Why do we doctors do what we do?
Many people would answer that question with a mundane response; that of the typical: "They do it because they want to help others," but I disagree. An optimistic observation of it, surely, but ignorance bleeds in the sentiment.
Men are creatures of greed. Our passions drive us to fulfill our own selfish desires, that which include pursuing a profession as intricate as medical science. Some doctors only do it in pursuit of avarice, others for a far greater endeavor.
The cause I sought after:
Immortality.
The great cure for our inevitable demise. My research into cancer began with that one very question: "Is there a cure for death?" I recall pondering this quite a few times throughout my life. This question would sneak up on me during the darkest, bloodiest battles of war. It approached me as my eyes closed, countless times in hope to dream, only to stay awake and count the stars. Wondering...pondering...
When I had returned from the war, I had set out to make it my mission in finding such a cure. I started out treating cancer in those patients older than 50. Each one came to me as frail and as feeble as they were. A whole life's story to tell, some even lacked regret and were more than happy to pass on to the golden gates up above. Regardless of their beliefs, I had made it my duty to find their cure. Some successful, but so many were not. The countless tears I saw shed when I had failed as a doctor, to tell them that they only had so many months to live.
This sad reality I had refused to accept, I had also grown numb to. It was another person. It was another death certificate. Each time my hand guided the ink on the paper, my mind would wander. Forgetting what it was that I was truly writing. Somebody has passed on, and I have failed.
I have always failed.
It would be that disconnect that set me to pursue this field differently. My search for The Death of Death would have no choice but to move away from those who had experienced all that life had to offer. I found that my answer must lie elsewhere. Where life had hardly even begun.
I founded a children's hospital.
Much like the special, hidden potential of those in the rawest of stem cells, I knew that my answer could only be found in youth. Children so young yet equally as feeble. For them, God had played an even nastier hand. Cursed onto this planet to be forced to suffer without a single day to look back on when they had not suffered before. The promise I made to the woman who intruded into my hospital years afterwards would be the same promise I made to these kids.
I would not let them die.
They would not share the same fate my child did.
"So, Mister Cho," the woman had spoke to me from across the dining table. In her hand an ornate pink mug, decorated with an intricate floral pattern where butterflies emerged from its handle. "Do you have kids of your own? I've seen the way you respond to the little ones...you're so sweet with them, like a natural father."
I took a pause, lifting my eyes from my studies so I could stare into those amber runes of majesty.
"I do not." I responded. It was blunt.
"That's a shame." She had looked down at her mug, proceeding to rub her finger against its handle as if my response had made this sudden conversation awkward. "I really thought you might have been."
"No." I responded again, "Never."
There was that silence again. Our company seemed to enjoy it so. A deafening sound where none could hear our voices, they were shot down by one another. I had found connecting with adults more difficult as I grew older, and here I was having to speak to one in this haven I had set for myself.
"Well, maybe someday, then." She finally broke that silence that urged me to bite my tongue. I felt a wreck whenever I began to imagine myself as a father. Even some of the children had picked up a fancy nickname for me: Papa Cho. But I dare not correct them. I fear for them to learn the truth. I had failed the first kid, my own flesh and blood, laid sprawled there in that ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ and why, oh why, did you not just let him stay ▇▇▇▇▇▇ so he could—
"I think you'd make an excellent father, Papa Cho." I found a warmth had touched my hand, yet as I had not expected her to reach out and touch me, my hand jerked back and I was forced out of my thoughts. I stared back at her, and her smile left her face, seemingly concerned for a doctor. "Oh, I didn't mean to startle you…"
"It's...quite all right." I didn't wish to stress out my patients.
"You've been spacing out, doctor. Have you been taking care of yourself? Sleeping right?"
"Of course."
That was a lie.
"Have you?" But that woman's voice caught me off guard. She saw right through my white lies just like a mother. Suppose I should have congratulated her for assuming that role before the birth.
"Not lately, no." I felt that since I was already caught in it, I had to reveal the truth. Ever since she came into my life, adjusting to this had taken a toll on me. Countless nights of laying awake and staring at my ceiling, strategizing each plan I prepared. To fight this devil that attacked her body and assure she and her son would be safe, I had to make sure there would be no error in any of her treatments.
But the devil she acquired was a challenging one.
Metastatic Thyroid Cancer: an already unknown creature in this field. We doctors have studied this butterfly-shaped gland and have yet to have itself reveal its all to us. The second challenge of her treatment was that of protecting the fetus. Although in some cases the children are ultimately spared the crippling fate of their mother within her safety, metastatic made his survival rates unsure. To guarantee my victory, I had to track this beast at every angle, yet without wasting any time. I had to know when to strike, without a single fault.
I look back on these days, and I wonder...
Why did she ever consider me a miracle worker?
[. . .]
