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Eldritch Horror? No, I'm A Doctor
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The shelf crashed into Ren's face at three in the morning, jolting him awake with a metal corner to his cheekbone.
"FUCK!" he shouted, rolling off the examination table where he'd been sleeping. Medical supplies scattered across the floor: bandages, gauze, antiseptic bottles. The earthquake had lasted maybe five seconds, but that was enough to turn his makeshift bed into a demolition zone.
That's the third one this week. You're developing a real talent for getting hit by inanimate objects.
"Shut up," Ren muttered, rubbing his face. The shelf had left a deep bruise. He could feel it swelling already.
Monday: choked on noodles.
Tuesday: choked on rice.
Wednesday: shelf to the face.
Thursday is tomorrow. I'm placing bets on what kills you next.
"I said shut up."
My money's on the coat rack. It's been looking at you weird.
Ren stood up and surveyed the damage. This was the fourth earthquake in six days. Small ones, mostly. Tremors that made the building shake and items fall from shelves. Nothing catastrophic, but persistent. Annoying. And increasingly frequent.
He walked to the window and looked out at the street. Four in the morning. The industrial district was dark and quiet, except for a few scattered lights in distant buildings. No signs of panic. No emergency vehicles. Just another earthquake in a city that was apparently built on unstable ground.
This isn't normal.
He returned to cleaning up the mess, picking up bandages and bottles, reorganizing the shelf that had attacked him. His cheek throbbed with each movement.
"You know what?" Ren said aloud.
"This is bullshit. I've been in this city for two months, and in the past week alone I've almost died three times from completely mundane accidents. Twice from choking on food. Once from a shelf. This is ridiculous."
Don't forget the noodle incident.
"That was one of the choking incidents."
No, that was the first one. The second was when you choked on rice yesterday.
"Both are food related choking. They count as the same category."
That's not how statistics work.
"I don't care how statistics work. The point is this city is trying to kill me through incompetence."
Or you're just clumsy.
"I am not clumsy. I performed surgery with a chainsaw. That requires precision."
And yet you can't eat noodles without nearly dying.
"That was because of the earthquake!"
The rice wasn't.
"The rice was because I was startled by the earthquake from the day before!"
Excuses.
Ren grabbed a broom and began sweeping up broken glass from a shattered antiseptic bottle. The smell of alcohol filled the clinic, sharp and medicinal.
"These earthquakes are getting worse," he said after a moment of silence.
"More frequent. Stronger. That's not natural geological activity. That's something else."
Well I start to notice it too
"I've been using my brain the whole time. I just didn't want to admit that something weird was happening because admitting weird things are happening means I have to deal with weird things happening."
Ah yes. The Ren Hector philosophy of crisis management: ignore it until it literally hits you in the face.
"It works."
You have a bruise on your cheek that says otherwise.
Ren finished sweeping and dumped the glass in the trash. He sat down at the reception desk, still rubbing his injured face. The bruise was going to be spectacular by morning. Maybe he should use some of his regenerative gel on it. But that seemed wasteful for something as minor as a shelf induced facial injury.
"Okay," he said quietly.
"Let's discuss this seriously. These earthquakes are not normal. The frequency is increasing. The intensity is increasing. And they all seem to be centered beneath this area. What's your analysis?"
Underground conflict. Most likely supernatural in nature. The tremors are too localized and too regular to be natural seismic activity.
"That's what I thought too. Which means someone is fighting directly beneath my clinic."
Or something is being summoned.
Ren paused. "That's a disturbing thought."
You live in a world with gates, monsters, and eldritch abominations. Summoning rituals are well within the realm of possibility.
"Fair point. So what do we do about it?"
We could move.
Ren stared at the ceiling.
"Move? Move where? I just set up this clinic two months ago. I have a location. I have a sign. You want me to just abandon all that?"
Better than dying to a summoning ritual.
"I'm not going to die to a summoning ritual. I'm Eldrith abomination. I can handle myself."
Finally admit that you are an abomination and you almost died to noodles.
"That was an accident!"
Twice.
"DIFFERENT FOOD!!"
They sat in silence for a moment, the only sound the quiet ticking of a clock on the wall.
Then the System spoke again.
You know, we could actually move the clinic if you wanted to.
Ren's head snapped up. "What?"
Move the clinic. Relocate. Find a new building.
"What the fuck are you talking about? You can do that?"
Of course I can. I'm a System. I have spatial manipulation capabilities. Moving a building's worth of equipment is trivial.
"YOU CAN DO THAT?!" Ren stood up, his chair scraping loudly against the floor.
"You've been able to do that THE WHOLE TIME?!"
Yes?
"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME?!"
You didn't ask.
"I DIDN'T ASK?! I DIDN'T ASK?!" Ren's voice rose to a shout.
"You're supposed to INFORM me of important capabilities! That's what assistants do! They provide relevant information without being asked!"
I'm not your assistant. I'm a System. There's a difference.
"THERE'S NO DIFFERENCE! YOU'RE LITERALLY IN MY HEAD PROVIDING SUPPORT AND COMMENTARY! THAT'S AN ASSISTANT!"
I prefer 'unwilling participant in your medical chaos.'
"WE DON'T COMMIT CHAOS! WE PROVIDE INNOVATIVE TREATMENT!"
You used a chainsaw.
"IT YOUR FUCKING CHAINSAW USAGE!"
It work right?.
"IT WORKED, BUT WHY THE FUCK IS IT A CHAINSAW?!"
That's not the point.
"THEN WHAT IS THE POINT?!"
The point is you never asked if I could relocate the clinic. So I never told you. That's how our relationship works. You ask questions, I provide answers. You don't ask, I don't tell.
Ren wanted to scream. He wanted to grab the System by its robot throat and shake it. But since the System didn't have a physical form, he settled for clenching his fists and taking several deep breaths.
"Okay," he said slowly, forcing calm into his voice.
"Okay. So you can move the clinic. That's good to know. That's VERY good to know. Information I definitely should have had TWO MONTHS AGO, but fine. Water under the bridge. Moving on."
Are we moving the clinic then?
"No."
No?
"No. If we move, we look weak. And I am not weak. Whatever is happening beneath this building, we're going to deal with it when it becomes a problem. Until then, we stay."
Even if it means more earthquakes?
"Even if it means more earthquakes. I've survived worse."
Have you though?
"Yes. I survived a fucking Eldritch god. This is just a city with bad infrastructure and possibly some maniac fighting in the sewers."
That's a very specific assumption.
"It's an educated guess based on context clues."
Or paranoia.
"INFORMED paranoia."
They lapsed into silence again. Ren returned to the examination table, cleared off the remaining debris, and lay back down. His cheek still throbbed. The bruise would definitely be visible by morning.
"You know what the worst part is?" Ren said quietly.
That you almost died to shelve?
"No. The worst part is that I'm starting to get used to this. The earthquakes. The lack of customers. It's becoming normal. And that's concerning."
Character growth. How unexpected.
"Shut up. I'm trying to be introspective."
Introspection is wasted on you.
"Your mom is wasted on you."
Still with the mom jokes.
"They're classics for a reason."
Ren closed his eyes, trying to get a few more hours of sleep before dawn. The clinic was quiet except for the usual creaks and settling sounds of an old building. His cheek hurt. His pride hurt more. Getting attacked by furniture was not how he'd envisioned his medical career going.
Tomorrow better be a normal day. No earthquakes. No choking. No shelves. Just normal, boring medical work.
He was just starting to drift off when another tremor shook the building. Small. Brief. But enough to rattle the windows and make the surgical tools clink together on their tray.
Ren opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling.
"I hate this city."
The city hates you back.
"Good. The feeling's mutual."
.
.
.
Morning arrived with no additional earthquakes, which Ren took as a minor victory. He got up, cleaned himself up, adjusted his plague doctor mask over his bruised face, and prepared for another day of having no customers.
The clinic was quiet. The street outside was quiet. Everything was exactly as it had been for the past week: empty, silent, and vaguely ominous.
Ren sat at the reception desk with a cup of coffee, being extremely careful not to choke on it.
"So," he said conversationally. "Any bets on how long until the next earthquake?"
Four hours.
"That's oddly specific."
I'm tracking the pattern. They're occurring roughly every six to eight hours now. The interval is decreasing.
"Wonderful. So eventually they'll be constant."
Probably.
"And you still think we shouldn't move?"
I think YOU said we shouldn't move. I was perfectly fine with relocating.
"Right. My decision. My consequences."
Your funeral.
"Literally, probably."
They sat in companionable silence for a few minutes, Ren sipping his coffee carefully, the System presumably doing whatever Systems did when they weren't being sarcastic.
Then the door exploded open.
Not opened. Exploded.
The wood splintered as a figure crashed through it, stumbling into the clinic with enough force to knock over a chair.
"Doctor!" the figure gasped, his voice raw and desperate. "I need help..."
Then he collapsed face-first onto the floor.
Ren was on his feet instantly, his coffee forgotten. He moved around the desk and knelt beside the fallen man, his professional instincts overriding his surprise.
And then he got a good look at the patient.
What the fuck.
The man's skin was completely burned off.Completely gone. Raw muscle and exposed tissue covered his entire body. His hair was gone. His eyelids were gone, leaving his eyes staring and unblinking. The eyeballs themselves were clouded, probably damaged by exposure.
But what caught Ren's attention were the boots.
Military boots. High grade combat boots. Or what used to be military boots. They had melted and fused directly with the man's feet, the synthetic material bonding with flesh in a grotesque fusion of fabric and biology.
He's a soldier. Military. Special Forces, probably, based on the boot quality.
If Ren hadn't looked closely, if he'd just seen the figure stumbling through the door, he might have mistaken him for a monster.
But this was human. Barely. But human nonetheless.
Ren checked for a pulse. Weak but present. Breathing was shallow and labored. The man was in critical condition. Shock, severe burns, probable internal damage, and who knew what else.
This is bad. This is very bad.
He stood up, pulled on his surgical gloves, and looked down at the unconscious soldier.
"Let's proceed to the operation room."