Agent Alpha, Chapter 4

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Length (rounded up): 600 words, 2 min. 30 sec.

Agent Alpha, Chapter 4

The sounds of heavy footsteps wakes you up. You open your eyes just to see the Director approaching your bed. Obviously, you aren’t in the naval base any longer, but you are being gently treated in the medical facility of the Agency.

He salutes you respectfully. ‘Thank you very much for your self-sacrificing service, Agent. The information you gave us helped the Agency to prevent a devastating terrorist attack. We are extremely obliged to you.’

‘I was only doing my duty, Sir,’ you say humbly.

None of you knows what to say to each other next. Clearly, the price of success could be too high for you. The tower wasn’t high enough, or three must have been some problem when the parachute opened. Whatever. The explanation didn’t matter anymore, but only the terrific outcome.

Your landing was a very hard one, causing dozens of minor and major fractures. Now, most of your body is draped in casts.

First of all, the outsized and thick piece of the neck-and-torso fibreglass cast narrowly dresses your trunk. It captures the lower part of your head all around, and the solid mass surrounds the neck like a bulky and rigid collar. While enveloping your neck, it reaches all the way up to your ears. At the rear side, its protuberance provides firm support for the nape. You are denied of moving your head, and your chin rubs against the cushioned rim of the fibreglass suit that is officially called a Risser cast.

Totally frozen, the whole upper body is perfectly imprisoned in a customised holder that seems to be carved from white stone. Every time you take a breath, your chest presses against the stiff shell that closely follows the shape of the entire torso. The solidified bonds inescapably envelop you from the shoulders down to the loins.

Like a massive and substantial armour, it absolutely anchors your body parts, rendering you almost immobile.

Since you are half-sitting, you can easily see both of your broken legs, too, which are encased in two identical long casts. Your lower limbs are wrapped in a DLLC that start at the thighs and end just before the toes, and hanging in a pair of lambskin-lined slings. An elaborate contraption of holders, ropes, pulleys and bars is mounted above the bed to keep your horribly fractured legs in the air.

Your legs are completely shattered, but this is not the real cause why you aren’t too satisfied. You're sad to look at your toes sticking out of the slot at the end of the leg casts: you can see them, but you can't make them to move.

And you cannot feel and flex either your feet, your shins or your knees. This happens not because of the enormous weight, the insurmountable stiffness, or the size of the leg casts you wear. Namely, you cannot control your legs any longer.

When landing, you’ve broken your spine, that’s why you are put into such an extensive body cast. This is the reason why you’re paralysed.

You were able to defeat General Seagull, but your victory couldn’t be perfect. You won’t be able to walk, even if the big fibreglass exterior is peeled off in six months. For the rest of your life, you changed from a great and victorious field agent into a wheelchair-bound paper-shuffler.

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-- Option 1: How about starting this story over again to find a happier ending? Chapter 2
-- Option 2: If you would like to dive into something different, visit my Story Guide.

From: Chapter 14
To: Chapter 2