The process of standing up took at least ten minutes. Dr Escobar proved to be surprisingly strong. She supported Swan, who was naked beneath the blanket, as he slid down from the tall gurney. His legs were useless and he had to cling to her with his barely-functioning hands. Except for the muscles in his face, his fingers and his feet, his body was flaccid so that even his head drooped at the end of his long neck. “I’m sorry, Doctor. I’m sorry,” he kept saying, until finally he was able to support himself by digging his nails into the polyethylene padding of the gurney. He was panting and drooling.
“See? It wasn’t so hard!” she said.
“You’re doing wonderfully, Mr Swan!” said the elevator.
“Where are my clothes?” he asked weakly.
“Incinerated,” the machine answered.
Dr Escobar stood viewing Swan’s spindly body without expression. His knees were shaking. “There’s no way I can walk,” he said.
“We’ll rest a minute. Then, you hold onto the side while I push.”
“The gurney is mechanized,” the elevator said.
“Where do I turn it on?”
“You only have to will it to go.”
“Oh. One of those,” she said. “But I have other things I need to concentrate on.”
“Let Mr Swan do it then,” said the elevator.
So it was Swan who drove the gurney to his arraignment with his mind. He imagined a pair of hands that pushed and steered it as he shuffled unsteadily along its side. Then, he had to imagine a second pair of smaller hands which pulled in the opposite direction whenever he feared he’d lose his balance. With Dr Escobar in the lead, they moved into the hall.
“The happiest things happen to happy people!” the elevator trilled as the doors slid closed behind them.
To Swan’s surprise, the building was completely different from the one he’d explored during his astral travels. (So it had been a dream!) The hallways were spotless and shining, with bright anodized tiles and glowing floral patterns on every wall.
After inching their way around several corners, they reached the Chief Executrix’s office. Her door with its ornamental trim of metallic gold, stood open. Even before they entered, Swan could see her sitting at the center of the vaulted room with its 360° panorama of flowers undulating in a soft breeze. Cissy was a remarkable woman, possessing both physical beauty and alpha-female qualities. Her shapely calves were gracefully crossed beneath her rococo-style desk with bowed-out legs that ended in carved cat paws. Madame Viva Ananda’s own legs, as well as the rest of her exposed skin—her decolletage, her arms and face—were enlivened by an image of glossy blue water that rippled outwards from the center of her cleavage. Swan was instantly reminded of the porno-dancer he’d seen in the hermit’s cave as well as the lady in the lantern.
“Ah, Dr Escobar. Mr Swan. Please come in!”
Swan drove the gurney forward, still naked, lurching alongside on his skinny legs.
If Madame Executrix was surprised by his nudity, she didn’t show it. She smiled as she came around her desk to greet him. Swan struggled to push himself upright as she drew close and embraced him warmly, wrapping her arms around him so that her bosom flattened against his chest and she could nuzzle his ear. When at last she released him, he would have toppled backwards had Dr Escobar not stepped up from behind to grab his waist.
“Mr Swan, I’m so happy you’ve chosen to approach me like this!” the Madame said. “I take this as a signal of your receptivity!” She took a step back and scanned him up and down, where her look seemed to linger for a long second on his intromittent organ. “In this office, I strive to make our message clear,” she said before lifting her eyes. “We do not police the body. We do not go in for shaming. We’re here to mete out justice, not to judge. You see the difference, I’m sure. Your extraordinary display of openness impresses me.”
At the end of her speech, Swan fell forward onto the gurney. He was bent at the waist with his nose and forehead pushed hard into its plastic coating as a means of keeping his body from sliding off.
Dr Escobar, realizing Swan’s predicament, leaned her weight against his buttocks. “Yes,” the doctor said. “Mr Swan and I have discussed the accusations against him and he’s expressed his willingness to confess.”
“Oh, you’re such a dear young man!” Madame Executrix enthused. She reached over the doctor to pet Swan’s bony back. “Even when we met, you seemed—and I mean this in the kindest way—a most free-spirited and lovely person.”
Swan, who’d been straining to keep his knees locked, suddenly buckled.
“Oh dear!” Madame Executrix said. “Shall we get him back on the stretcher before he falls?”
The doctor and the much taller Chief Executrix changed positions, and it was the Madame who gathered Swan’s body from behind and pulled him upright. He was limp, like a lifeless doll. She thread her arms under his armpits and held him firmly against her. The blue light from her watery skin tinted Swan’s pale ribs and his head fell back on her shoulder. He could feel her breath on his neck and her dress bunched up against his buttocks. Dr Escobar took hold of his ankles and together they lifted him onto the gurney. The blanket was under him now and, without anything else to cover him, the two women sat down at the desk to discuss his fate. Naked, face up, directly beneath a glaring light that beamed down from the ceiling, with his penis condensed to a flabby nub; all he could do was listen to their deliberations.
It seemed that Madame Chief Executrix had never had any interest in killing Swan. The prospect of his execution never came up. What the two women discussed, for the most part, were ways to modify his therapy. The Madame had his name placed in the registry of the mentally disturbed which, she said, offered him a range of legal protections. He would, of course, be required to maintain a continuous therapeutic relationship with his psychiatrist for the indefinite future. Further, it was mandated that Swan should visit the Chief Executrix’s residence alone each Tuesday evening, so that she could personally monitor his progress.
At the end of their discussion, the Madame Chief Executrix carried a small hand-screen, with a molded frame like a bright blue garland, to Swan’s bedside for his imprints on the legal orders.
Dr Escobar described each edict as Swan pretended to listen. At the end of each section, he was asked to touch his finger to the screen to confirm that he understood and accepted the ruling. The Madame would affirm the order by touching the screen as well. As the documents flashed before him, Swan noticed that the Chief Executrix’s name really was Cissy. Mme Cissy Viva Ananda, HHE, Chief Executrix, Department of Hominid Health, Director of Therapeutic Parks, Judge and Executioner. Several of the documents had to be endorsed by his attending psychiatrist and Swan saw that Dr Escobar’s first name really was Bunny. Bunny Escobar, Psychotherapist & Life Coach, MA, BSc. The Madame made it abundantly clear that Swan was never again to enter the Nature Preserve under threat of reinstating the original order of Capital Punishment. The screen was placed beside his right hand and he touched it with his finger. Dr Escobar inserted Swan’s arm into the same sort of device she’d used the morning he first met her. A humming and clicking sound resulted in the disappearance of his bracelet key. Swan touched his finger to the screen. Dr Escobar touched the screen and passed it to the Chief Executrix who touched it as well. He was required by law to be injected with a traceable seed so that his internal functions, his emotional state, and his location could be monitored by her office. Swan fingered the screen as did the two women. Should he, by accident, come into contact with Ebony O’Brien, he was not to interact with her in any way. Even if she spoke to him, he was not to respond. He was not to look at her directly. If she were to enter an elevator while he was aboard, it was his duty to exit immediately. To disobey this order was also a capital crime. Each pressed a finger to the screen to confirm this. After the formalities of the finger impressions were completed, Madame Viva Ananda leaned over Swan’s body holding a faux antique silver syringe to inject the traceable seed.
“We put it here where it’s safe,” she said as she swabbed some anesthetic cream over his testes. She looked directly into his eyes then. “I quite enjoy putting these in! How does it make you feel?”
“Make me feel?”
“Some find it exciting!” she whispered as she wrapped her cold fingers around his fuzzy scrotum and pumped it softly.
Swan shut his eyes and kept them tightly shut. Pain or pleasure, both were meaningless. His mind had once again removed itself from the scene he was experiencing. It was something he’d learned how to do during his weeks inside the cocoon. He knew how to distance himself from whatever troubled him, whether it be probing machinery or the Madame’s chilly fingers. He did not, at the moment, wish to look at the liquid blue face that smiled down at him. He was too busy trying to project his thoughts deep into the interior of his body. “Ottala! Please listen! As soon as I can escape this place, I’ll find a way to get you out!
Kind of figures doesn't it. Cats love playing with fuzzy balls. One can only assume reality has wrapped its cold fingers around some part of your life to cause your tardiness, Mr. Bix. We hope the grip was loose and fleeting. Back to your gurney (desk)!