Chapter Two - A Slice of Happiness
“Times of peace aren’t uncommon. But they never really last.”
--Deus Ex, June 2057
***
“So, what’ve you got for me?” I asked Myalis while looking over at Dumbass the First.
I suppose I could start with the youngest and work my way up.
“Sure,” I said. “So we’ll start with Nose, or is Spark younger?”
I believe that Nose is the youngest, judging by the scans Dumbass has taken.
The kittens were all gathered around the kitchen island still, even Lucy who returned from ordering breakfast with a sly smile on. Daniel had pulled around on his chair and waved me hello before deep-diving into his phone.
Nose and Spark were both standing near the edge of the table and looking at me without blinking.
Nose... and that is an awful name that I’ve no doubt you had something to do with, seems to suffer from Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. It’s at the third stage. It’s rather surprising that he can still function moderately well. He has a few other conditions mostly centred around his nasal cavity and esophagus.
“Nose is a tough little shit,” I said.
Nose nodded seriously. “Yeah.”
“Got a cure?”
Obviously. A nano repair suite should be sufficient to cure the ailment.
I grinned. “Don’t keep us waiting, Myalis. And tab it all up for me in one go at the end.”
A box appeared on the island, small and cheap. Inside was an inhaler with a tank the size of a soda can and a red button on the top. Its front was shaped like a rather basic oxygen mask.
Spread out the use over the course of the day. Tell Nose to drink a lot of water and have a big, varied meal later. He’s got a few nutritional deficiencies. In fact, all of them, you included, do.There are also traces of heavy metals in your blood and in some of your organs, some nitrates, plastics, and a few other chemicals that I suspect were used as fertilizer and pesticides. It’s fortunate that humans are so resilient, or you’d all be tumorous masses by now.
I slid the inhaler over to Nose. “Take a puff every hour or so. And then eat a lot tonight. Oh, and down a couple of glasses of water, alright?” I’d need to get some sort of detox thing for all the kittens later, but that could probably wait a day.
“Yeah!” he said before taking the inhaler. Everyone watched as he took a deep breath from it, then coughed a few times. “Tickles,” he said.
“It’ll get better,” I said. “Sparks, you’re up next.”
“Alright!” Sparks said. “Hit me up, doc Cat.”
Sparks has an interesting one. It seems like a sort of prion disease. I suspect he came into contact with something while very young. It has mostly kept to his parietal lobe, reducing his ability to feel touch.
“Right,” I said. “It’s why he’s called Spark, he likes licking power outlets.”
“I don’t!” Spark protested. “It just feels weird.”
A simple Neuro Regenerative should do.
Another box, this one with a red plastic nib and drawn instructions on the side to place it against the crook of the arm. “Can you figure it out?” I asked.
“I’m not an idiot,” he said before fumbling with the injector. He didn’t even wince as he pulled back his sleeve and jabbed it in. “When’s this going to work?” he asked.
It will take approximately an hour for the first signs of regression to show. Six for a complete cure. Also, he’s far too thin. I suspect that he can’t feel hunger pangs at all.
“Give it until this afternoon,” I said. “And eat more. You’re too damned thin. Tim, you’re too thin too.”
Tim here is missing a leg. That much is rather obvious. Otherwise, he’s in decent health.
“Tim’s new to the kittens,” I explained. It was kind of shit that being new meant that he hadn’t collected a bunch of problems yet.
“Will you regrow my leg?” he asked.
“Do you want a new leg or a prosthetic?” I asked while wiggling my metal fingers around.
“Can I have one like yours?”
“Only if you want to lose an arm,” I snarked back. It earned a few laughs, which was nice. The mood with the kittens was about as high as I’d ever seen it. “But nah, just a normal Samurai-grade prosthetic. Mine can fire rockets. Yours... won’t.”
“Aww,” he said.
His current prosthetic is rather pitiful. I’d suggest a Sun Watcher replacement. There are some that are inexpensive, require little to no maintenance, and are far superior to what he has. They can also expand over time so that they won’t require replacing for some years. I’d also suggest an anti-rash cream.
I tapped the table. “Come on, Myalis, don’t keep us waiting.”
Tim’s new leg came in a little case, and next to it came a small jar of some sort of cream with instructions drawn all around it. “Spark, Nose, wanna help him put it on?”
The three rushed off with the couches in the living room, with Tim demanding that they be careful with his new leg.
“Bargain,” I said.
“Cat,” he replied.
Bargain has a few smaller issues. Chemical burns on the lower half of his body, a slight defect in his heart, and a minor case of cerebral palsy as well. The skin issues can be relieved with a cream. I’d advise the same for your own burns if you ever want to repair them actually. The lung issue will require a Nano Regenerative Suite. The cerebral palsy will require a Neuro Regenerative. It won’t disappear instantly. He will need to exercise, stretch, and straighten his posture over the course of some months.
“Alright,” I said. “Lay it on the table.”
The boxes appeared. Bargain looked at them, then up to me. I could see the gear turning behind his eyes.
“No more wheeling and dealing,” I said. “Not with me or Lucy.”
He nodded slowly. “And the others?”
“Do as you want with them, but be fair to the other kittens,” I said. “Oh, and you’ll need to stand taller and exercise to fix yourself up properly. And probably eat something other than the shit we usually have.”
“Alright, deal,” he said.
“Nemo?” I asked.
Nemo popped her head up and blinked at me.
Very mild autism, some selective mutism, and a terrible diet. A Neuro Regenerative would fix some of the issues with her brain, but most of Nemo’s problems are due to a poor diet and some psychological issues.
I nodded and flicked the next box that appeared her way. “You need to eat better too,” I said.
Nemo nodded, smiled, then ran off to see Tim and Sparks and the others.
You are aware that the Twins aren’t genetically twins at all, right?
“Yeah, they’re just missing the same bits,” I said.
The twins--who did look like each other, with the same shitty haircut, brown hair and eyes and too-pale skin--leaned forwards at the same time. “We want rocket launcher arms,” they said as one.
“No,” I vetoed.
Two new arms later, and they were off helping each other install their new prosthetics and playing around with them over in the living room.
“Okay, so, for my final acts... Daniel, you’ve got some sort of muscular fuck-up-edness, right?”
“That’s the medical term, yeah,” he agreed with a grin.
Muscular dystrophy. Chemically induced at that. A rather simple fix.
I flung the next box over to him and he saluted me back. “Thanks, love.”
“Don’t try.”
“How long until I can start dancing?”
Two to three days.
I snorted. “Your pasty white ass will never be able to dance,” I said. “But in a few days, you’ll be able to traumatize the kids by trying.”
He flipped me the bird, but it was while still smiling. “We’ll see.”
And finally, we have Junior. She... is merely malnourished, with traces of contaminants in her blood that will pass eventually.
“Junior,” I said.
“Yeah?” she asked as she looked up from her bowl.
“You’re too fucking skinny.”
“Fuck you,” she said.
I felt a shy, tentative hand touching my shoulder. “What about me?” Lucy asked.
Lucy has Multiple Sclerosis. A simple enough thing to cure.
A fresh box appeared on the table.
Give her those. Then allow for a few hours to restore all of her cognitive functions. It might be mildly unpleasant. Afterwards, she’ll need to practice walking and running once more.
“You’ll need to take these,” I said. “But they’ll make you feel all tingly.”
She smiled up at me. “Tingly, huh?” she asked. “Will you help me get rid of all my tingles?”
I leaned down and our lips met for a moment while I fiddled with the box with my free hand. I had the tablets out soon enough and was carefully pressing the single pill between her lips.
“For fuck’s sake, get a room,” Junior said. “Don’t do that in front of my cereal.”
Lucy and I happily complied, though it was a bit hard to make it back to the room with our faces practically glued together.
“Oh, oh man, it really is tingly,” Lucy said as she sat on the edge of the bed. “My feet are all... You know when your arms go to sleep and then they come awake?” She wiggled her legs, then wiggled them some more as she slid off the pyjama pants she was wearing to expose two beautiful dark legs.
I got to my knees to capture one of her feet. Carefully, I started to massage it, just a bit of pressure in the way she always liked. The pleased little noise she made said a lot.
I leaned down and pressed a kiss onto the top of her foot.
And then, before I could lean back, a pair of panties dropped down and came to rest around her ankles.
I looked up to meet Lucy’s bright eyes. “You said you’d take care of all the parts that tingled.”
“So I did,” I agreed.
***
That last author note was enough for a 5 star rating on its own
included, do.There -> add space “do. There”
Cat gets to play Santa with medical treatments now like she got to play Santa with guns the day before. She’s going to get sainted some day
Nah, she already has been. She got Samuraied.
@FireflyFanatic I'd rathe getting Samuraied then getting sainted. Samurais get to play with the better toys
I don't adore the implication that autism is something to cure in this chapter, but I also love that we are even discussing disabilities in a real way at all so, I am in a forgiving mood lol. Also, dear god, MS, my heart goes out to Lucy. Thank you for the chapter. :)
Had a decent discussion when this chapter came out (oh lord that was a while ago!) with a few people on the spectrum and some doctors/psychologists. It was a weird but interesting talk, and in the end I decided to leave the section as-is.
I think that if the technology to remove or entirely elevate the disability existed, it would be called a 'cure,' even though ASD isn't technically an illness.
@RavensDagger big issue I take with it is that none of the "fixing" is done involving any agency of the person with autism. She is a minor being given strange alien drugs without being given any indication of what is being done or allowed to make any informed decision on the matter. Also it being a neuro-regenerative implies autism is a degenerative disorder which is completely off. Like it fits within the story as some sh*t things the aliens might think is a good thing to do, but as is without commentary it's harmful. There's whole histories of genocide against people with autism including a sizeable amount of people put in camps during the Holocaust for it.
@Murbellass Hmm, I used Neuro-regenerative since autism is a neurodivergence disorder. It's not degenerative, but I don't think I said it was?
@RavensDagger as in there's nothing to regenerate based on the diagnosis listed. Divergence meaning it doesn't fit within some societal framework of what has been deemed "normal" but nothing is actually lost or wired incorrectly and you can't regenerate something that isn't missing.
So on some level you have the implication that the regenerative is actually doing neural restructuring to rearrange her brain into some different form, and being done without informed consent of the person it's being done to.
@Murbellass But the brain of someone who has autism literally is wired incorrectly. That's what makes that person have autism.
I'm going to have to look it up to be certain (I'm not a neurologist) but from what I recall, a person with autism has a genetic mutation that results in too many or too few connections between different lobes. I can't recall if that mutation is entirely a genetic fluke or if there's some environmental issues at play, but... yeah, no, an autistic brain isn't a healthy brain.
That in no way excuses mistreatment of people with ASD, let's be clear on that, but it does mean that what they have isn't optimal for their health. You wouldn't mistreat someone born with a disabled limb, but you wouldn't say that they're born without disability either.
@RavensDagger I love how you frame physical disability within your story, but your perspective on autistism and neurodivergency appears to not be rooted at all in current work going on within disability activism around autistic and neurodivergent self advocacy. If you are willing I could look up some reading for you or suggest googling "autistic self-advocacy" and reading more into things from the perspective of actual autistic people.
Mostly a lot of it centers on how most of the "disability" symptoms of autism are far more symptoms of stressed out or traumatized autistic people as it's mostly only a disability within competition centered colonial-capitalism (as are many disabilities). Much of the mistreatment of autistic people comes at the hands of neurotypical authority figures attempting to "cure" or teach/force autistic people to appear neurotypical for the sake of fitting into society (otherwise referred to as masking). These approaches to autistic treatment are almost universally harmful and your portrayal in this chapter plays directly into that's mistreatment.
@RavensDagger "Curing" Autism is a kind of identity death. It's too integral to the way we see the world. A schizophrenic could take medicine and no longer hallucinate, and they'd still be themselves, but if you purged the autism from my body you'd change me and my entire personality on a fundamental level.
@RavensDagger raven i love your writing but this still rubs me the wrong way. you havent responded to the criticisms leveled here. which are entirely correct, by the way -- autism is an integral part of who we are, not a problem to be fixed. it's only even a disability because society is hard-wired for neurotypicality. you cant just "cure" it. that's akin to trying to cure, like. sexual orientation or favorite music genre. its a part of our personality, not an illness
@spoonPrincess Hi!
I'll post this here, since I dug it up. It's a bit lazy of me to copy-paste a reply, but I do post this story on multiple sites and... yeah!
Okay! So, first, I wanna make this clear, we’re arguing over this specific subject. I’m not arguing at you, and while I might be passionate, I’m not angry at you, just at this subject overall.
Anyway~
So, autism. It’s a disability caused by differences in the brain. Honestly, I think that if you were to stretch the spectrum out enough, then there wouldn’t be a single person that doesn’t fit on it. We’re all wired differently, we all think a little differently. Some of that’s environmental, and plenty of it is neurological.
On the surface, the idea that autism is something that shouldn’t be ‘cured’ (insofar as you could, we can’t now, and I doubt medical science will ever be able to, not in our lifetimes) seems to insult a lot of people because it would mean ‘curing’ aspects of who someone is. And I think that for a person that’s just at level 1 on the spectrum (as per DSM-5) , that’s probably true.
At that level, issues are relatively small, an autistic person can learn to cope and live with their differences. They think somewhat differently, but it’s not in a way that should hamper them, if anything having people that see things in a different light can be super useful for society at large. A level 1 autist might have some social difficulties, but it varies between no worse than a non-autistic introvert and some issues adapting.
I agree that this level of neurodivergence shouldn’t be something that’s ‘cured.’ Society should be willing to adapt to different ideas and ways of treating people.
It’s past that line where, I think, autism goes from an interesting genetic quirk to a full-blown disability.
Have you ever spoken to a level 3 autistic person about their difficulties? They suffer. Their compulsions make them hurt. They’re often aware that they’re thinking in a way that’s actively harming them, and can’t do anything about it.
Most low-functioning autistic people die before seeing their 40th birthday. They have much higher support needs, their life is worse.
The talk of autism not being a disability is actively harming them because it discourages people from giving them the support that they need.
From experience, there are two broad groups that speak a lot about autism advocacy, people who are high-functioning autistic people themselves, and the people who have to take care of low-functioning autistic people. They do not see eye-to-eye on this issue.
@RavensDagger I have to disagree with you about autism being due to incorrect wiring or that an autistic brain is not a healthy brain. It is merely a different brain. "A brain" isn't accurate. I believe autism describes a few characteristics grouped together to describe a subset of humanity so we can recognize our wonderful diversity.
The label has helped me learn some uncommon ways that my son perceives or interacts with the world, and I can better help him grow by helping him where he is weakest and more importantly celebrating his strengths. It has also helped me know how to teach (and avoid antagonizing) certain students.
Compulsions occur more frequently with autism but one does not mean the other also exists or have the same cause. The compulsions may stem from distress of not fitting in or another anxiety (also very, very common with autism), and they may take root at a very early age -- making them difficult to figure out and develop better coping mechanisms. (This paragraph oversimplifies but hopefully gets the point across.)
A salient feature is some difficulty with (some) social interactions, and can also affect academic learning. There's a structured learning environment/process designed to facilitate reducing or eliminating these relative deficiencies.
My son took a battery of 10 tests only 2 were in the middle range of 2/3 of people, 2 were lower than 90%, leaving 6 in the top 1/3 with 3 higher than 99.99% of us. Is this due to incorrect wiring? He and my daughter sense some things differently, like the scratchiness of labels in their shirts. Unlike 2/3 of people I am introverted. Are these deficiencies to be cured, or differences to be appreciated? They are strengths in some situations.
Those low functioning that you mentioned face strong challenges, not to be minimized, and need a lot of support to live. Caring for them is draining beyond what most can understand. But that doesn't make them less human than anyone else. They may want/need curing from a heart problem, or several problems that may be much more common in those with autism, but that doesn't mean they should be "cured" of what we describe as autism in its entirety.
People have autism, Down Syndrome (like my daughter), or a missing limb. They are not defined by these "disabilities". It's a small piece of who they are. Author and reader don't define anyone, but are merely one aspect of one's person.
@Murbellass, @spoonPrincess, @Sarah_the_Demonic_Gerbil, @Elvenoob, @Ashelia, @Natalie2850, @Cobbly, @Lady_Rhea let me know if you think I should rewrite any of this.
I want to go on, but it's time for me to stop here. Reach out to me separately, if you want more.
@BothellRoyal good stuff. The core of all things here is you don't paternalistically think you automatically know better than any given autistic person what their own individual needs are, and you don't go in altering things about an autistic person without their consent and understanding. It isn't a defect to be fixed unless the autistic person of their own will and understanding sees it as such and is actively making the decision to undergo some form of alteration.
beyond that there is also crap tons of nuance around how society as a mess of colonial capitalism is filled with crap tons of things which actively conflict with neurodiverse people's ways of thinking and being and much of what we call autistic symptoms and behavior are actually just trauma responses to a world that places neurotypicality on a pedestal. Actual structural changes within communities and society at large to make space for the existence of neurodiverse people is the far more ethical way to improve the lives of autistic people rather than non-consensual "cures" forced upon them by allistics trying to make them "functional."
@Murbellass well said. I'm not sure capitalism is the primary cause of neurodiverse people's problems. Most people exhibiting autistic behaviors have pitied and ostracized them in other types of cultures. You are right that better places need to be opened for you/them because you have unique and valuable contributions to make in our society. This includes many companies, which some managers and owners are beginning to see. You don't fit most job requirements, but that's true for all of us. I'm interested in learning more about your case in some other venue. Can you DM me?
@BothellRoyal it's capitalism. it's "professionalism". it's predatory business practices. it's dishonesty as policy. it's all the aspects of society that are tuned for NTs and hostile to people like us.