Jack held his breath as Dr. Pol En went around the corner. A few moments later, a click could be heard as the X-Ray machine took a picture of his torso. “Alright,” Dr. Pol En said as she came back, “You can breathe now.” Jack let out his breath and breathed normally now that the picture was done.
Normally, Jack wouldn’t be doing something like this since he lived in America in his past world. He would usually do self pay because it was cheaper than just using insurance. However, he made an exception this time because Pol said that it was “on the house” and didn’t elaborate past that.
Now that he thought about it, what was it he was being used as a guinea pig for? Better ask. “Excuse me, Dr. Pol En-” “No need for that, my good sir.” Pol cut him off, an amused gleam in her eye. “After all, you are my winning ticket.” “Ah, yes, about that. What do you mean by ‘winning ticket’? Are you using me for something? If you are, I’d like to at least know what it is.”
Pol’s amusement drained away into annoyance, but it didn’t seem to be directed at him. Especially since she seemed to look off into some kind of distance as she led him back to ‘General Diagnostics’. She sat down at her swivel chair and gave a big ol’ sigh. “You were confused about how I was so young and, yet, a doctor, right?” She looked at Jack tiredly as she said this.
Jack rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, sorry about tha-” “Jeez, stop apologizing about that. We already made up. I forgave you, you did the same. Yadda yadda yadda.” That annoyed tone was back. Then it left just as quickly. “The reason I look so young is because I am young. I became a doctor at 19 years old, and graduated just three months ago.” Her face showed a good hint of smug pride, as well as in her voice.
“That’s also not counting the fact that I graduated High School at 12, got my first two PhDs in Medicine and Biology at 15, and have done over 15 difficult surgeries that were all successful.” Jeez, her entire being seemed to radiate smugness. “And all of that before graduation.” What was this bullshit? Was she some kind of medical drama protagonist like House or that one autistic doctor show? He never really saw that last one except through those memes. You know which ones he’s talking about.
“Wow, you must’ve been pretty busy throughout college.” Jack tried to not let his incredulousness and slight jealousy show through. First, it would’ve been impolite to do so for someone giving him a free check-up. Second, he didn’t want to either make her mad, or just feed her smugness should she notice his jealousy. It didn’t do much, though, considering how she’s preening like a peacock or cat. She looked as if she is saying “praise me more!” through nothing but her body.
Although, if she’s such a prodigy…
“Pol, I have to ask, why are you here, in such a remote little town, if you’re such a prodigy?” Jack’s question was a needle, as the balloon known as Pol En’s Ego popped and deflated before his very eyes. She slumped. “...Stupid contract…” She muttered angrily. “Huh? What contract?” Jack asked, leaning forward to hear her quiet muttering. She straightened up with a jolt and her response caused Jack to jump back at the sheer volume of her voice.
“That stupid contract I signed back when I was 18!” Her red face was in a grimace, and her eyes seemed to well up with tears. Though, Jack didn’t know if they were out of frustration or regret. Possibly both.
Pol calmed herself down with some breathing, her face reverting to her neutral look. She began her speech. “I was born to two loving parents 19 years ago in North City. However, despite the fact that they loved me, they also struggled financially. Living in North City, especially during the tail end of the recession that was happening there, made for a very strict life.” She leaned forward in her chair, propping her head on her hands. Her face starting to show something along the lines of sadness, but as if it was old sadness.
“I don’t remember much during my first 3 years of life, but I remember what happened when I was 4. I was excited to go to a movie with my parents, especially since we couldn’t afford to go except for once a month or so. This would be the second time we went in a month, literally 4 days after our last visit. I didn’t remember the reason back then, but Dad would later tell me that he had gotten a substantial promotion to a higher position. We were going again to celebrate that.”
Here, her eyes seemed to deaden. “I was so excited to go. So excited, that I tried to jaywalk across the street when I saw it. Usually, my mom, who would always hold onto my hand when we were out and about, would try to pull me back and force me to go to the crosswalk.” She paused. Jack could already see what was coming, but let her talk about it. She looked away from Jack, as if to hide her face.
“I guess she was just as excited as I was, because she just let me drag her along. I didn’t look both ways, since it usually was an area light with traffic. However… Some idiots decided to race down it at that exact moment. I don’t think I would’ve survived that, had Mom not thrown me back towards Dad, who was closest to the sidewalk.” Another pause. Then she turned back to Jack, who was trying to be as comforting as possible. Yet, it looked like her face was full of sad acceptance.
Makes sense, she had over 15 years to deal with this. The memory has probably faded to just feelings and concepts at this point.
“Do you know what eidetic memory is?” …Jack decided not to think about tempting fate like that again. He still nodded his head. Pol gave a bit of a surprised smile, still dampened by the subject matter though. “Then I’ll just say that I remember every detail of the aftermath, and head on with the next bit of my life.” She straightened her posture and started to lean back in her chair, while also giving a sigh.
“Safe to say, we didn’t go to the movies. I remember Mom’s funeral, Dad’s subsequent grieving, and how many people came to talk about her… I still didn’t know about the concept of death, yet. However, Mom’s death and its aftermath taught me pretty quickly.
“Both Mom and Dad had jobs, and Dad’s was supposed to give us a better future. With Mom’s death, though, Dad had to pick up every slack in both raising me and in life. Mom and Dad were planning to move into a better apartment building in a better block, especially with the new revenue from Dad’s promotion. Safe to say, that never happened.
“Dad had to immediately use all of his sick days and vacation days to take care of me and teach me everything a normal girl was supposed to learn. Imagine his surprise when I picked up reading and writing in a week, and could already read kindergarten books at age 4. The company he worked for actually seemed to care, because he got to raise me for 6 months before he was forced back to work.
“Once he did, he started to hire babysitters for me. Each one tried to teach me, and subsequently learned how much of a genius I was. Then I entered Kindergarten, and the teachers there quickly told my Dad that I was too smart for their class. They sent me up to 1st grade two months into Kindergarten. Then they did it again two months later when I learned everything in that small class.
“There I stayed for the rest of the year. However, I read up over the summer, and tested out of 3rd grade at 7 years old. I created a pattern of testing out of my grade every semester for the next 2 years. Yet, high school was different. I took advanced classes, and even had a professor from the famous North City University of Technology and Medicine come to put me in a college class for my study hall period. Safe to say, I had to spend each year normally at high school.
“Being a genius kid in a building full of egocentric teenagers didn’t lend me many friends. I was pretty lonely for a lot of my life, especially since my Dad was working more and more hours every year just to fuel my growth. I didn’t realize then, but I think I might’ve contributed to what happened after I graduated and entered North City University of Technology and Medicine at 13 to become a doctor and researcher.
“I wanted to become someone with a huge yearly income so I can give Dad a very early retirement, but, during the last few months of my first year at University, Dad died of overworking.” Pol, who was pouring her heart out, paused here. Jack was just staying silent to let her get this out.
Pol gave a very wet sniff. Tears weren’t pooling in her eyes, but Jack could tell that she was affected by it. “I don’t know why I’m telling you something so personal.” She said, still not looking directly at Jack. “Just know that Dad’s will gave me all of his money and possessions. Plus all of the money from his Life Insurance. Unfortunately, it couldn’t pay for all of my medical tuition. The last year was the one I needed the most. However, I still couldn’t pay it and the loan I would get from the government would cause me to stay in debt for over a decade.
“If it wasn’t for one of my classmates telling me about how some hospitals and towns would pay for my tuition and any debts I had, I wouldn’t be able to become a Doctor, or, at least, a debt-free one.” Jack could see as her grip on her pen tightened. “I managed to get a contract where I would spend 5 years working for what I thought would be a huge hospital in East City. It wasn’t until that I got there that I realized that the small village, Maya, had made the contract through someone at said hospital.” Her face grimaced in annoyance.
“Now I have to spend 5 years in a small town that can’t make use of all of my knowledge and expertise due to a lack of professional medical equipment.” Pol finally looked directly at Jack, her face the most deadpanned face he’s ever seen. “Even that X-Ray machine I used in that room was jerry-rigged by me to be as close to professional equipment as possible. If it wasn’t for the fact that I took a few classes in engineering to understand my medical equipment, I wouldn’t even have an X-Ray machine!”
Finally, Pol got to her point, as her face finally took on what Jack realized was desperate hope. “However, one of the stipulations of my contract is that I can get out of it if I can make a ‘medical breakthrough significant enough to require going to an official hospital’. You, my good sir, are my winning ticket to getting out of here, especially if what you say is true about only working out in the last few months.”
Jack blinked, he was being respectful throughout the explanation due to how heavy some of it was, but that still didn’t explain what she meant by him being her ticket. “What’s so special about my body? Shouldn’t everyone be able to do so after a few months? I mean, I wasn’t capable of this amount of progress when I was a teen, but I also wasn’t very serious about it then.”
She brushed some hair in front of her face to the side. Her smirk back on her face. “You’d be right about your progress, if you were in the World Army’s bootcamp. But you told me that you’ve only been working out a few hours a day. That kind of progress isn’t normal, so if we can figure out how you got so strong so quickly, then we can go to East City’s hospitals to check your body even further.”
Jack crossed his arms and nodded his head. He was starting to understand something. Something he kind of figured out with the lack of mention in history books and science books. They were only mentioned in myths and fairy tales.
Chakra really wasn’t widely known throughout the world, and any who saw it probably dismissed it for some kind of technology.
If Jack could get himself famous through his “discovery” of Chakra, then he can get money or specialized equipment to figure out Chakra. He wouldn’t have to guess on how it works over the course of months, if not years.
Really, the path forward was very simple, time to tell her what he found out.
“Doctor.” Jack straightened up, uncrossing his arms. He looked straight into her eyes. “I think I know exactly why I’m much stronger than would be possible.” She blinked with a surprised look on her face. “Oh? Then how?” She leaned forward in her chair.
Jack said, with as serious a voice as possible, “I found out about a mystical energy that I’ve dubbed as ‘Chakra’. It’s boosted my strength, enhanced my healing, and allows me to do things no one else is able to.”
Silence.
Then, Pol burst out laughing. She threw her head back so far that her swivel chair leaned back as far as it could go. Her hands were holding her stomach, and her legs were lifting off the floor. Her entire body shook from just how hard she’s laughing.
Jack just stayed as he was, red starting to flush up on his face. He felt a combination of embarrassment and anger flow through him as he watched Pol laugh. Still, he tried to not yell in anger and frustration.
Pol’s body started to calm down. Her shakes are still there, but he could see her trying to set herself back to calm.
“T-That’s one good joke.” She stuttered out, traces of laughter in her voice. She wiped her eyes. “I-I can still tell that you meant it, but that’s just some kind of village myth.” She sniffed, a few chuckles coming out. “How about you just leave the thinking to me? I actually know biology, and I’m pretty good at it, too.”
Jack could feel his anger and frustration starting to rise. He didn’t like being taken for a liar, and got into many arguments with family, friends, and strangers when they didn’t accept the truth he spoke. He tried his darnedest to keep his mouth from speaking all of his thoughts, which were very much ‘not nice’.
Pol, though, decided to go and get the X-Rays that had just finished forming. Once she came back, Jack had calmed down enough that he felt he could talk without insulting her. She pinned the sheets up on the little wall light thingy that doctors used to look at x-rays. Jack knew they had a name, but he was very much in the “don’t care” section with Pol’s mocking of him.
As she looked at the photos, she hummed and was in deep thought. “Starnge, your bones seem to be denser. So dense that it shows up as a blank white on the scans.”
Jack was careful with his next words. “Does that mean anything? I’m not a doctor, ya know?” Not careful enough to get rid of the light mocking in his ‘doctor’, though.
Pol had a bit of a smug smirk on her face as she turned and said, “It does, actually. Bones are supposed to be ‘not dense’ because they are supposed to ‘hold up’ the shape of the body and not weigh down the muscles. If you were to cut a human bone in half, it would kind of look like a sponge.” She looked back at the scans.
“What’s weird, though, is the fact that you weigh 90 Kilograms-” Jack converted it to around 200 pounds, “-when your bones should be making you around 95 to 100 Kilos if the density on the scans are right. Most weight comes from the muscles and internal soft organs, not the bones.” She cupped her face with her hand. “This does deserve some looking into.”
Jack, on the other hand, already figured out what made his bones so strong and caused the x-rays to be unable to pierce them. His Chakra. He wasn’t using it at the time of scanning, but maybe Chakra lingers in the body to mess with regular physics. It seems to have lingered in his bones the longest, though.
Hmm, maybe…
“Doctor,” Jack got her attention. His voice no longer holding frustration, but the ‘I’m right’ tone people use when they tease someone wrong. “Can we do this one more time? I think I can show you something that will knock your socks off.” Pol just sighed and nodded.
Line Break Here
“What in the world?!” Pol let out her exclamation when she looked at the new scans. They were much more different than what the last ones were. Distortions were everywhere, and streaks of his body were just a pure white, showing that no x-rays went through him at those spots.
Jack, meanwhile, now had his own smug smirk. His entire being radiating smug and pride. Truly, there was no other greater feeling than showing up an ‘intellectual’.
“I-I… What did you do? What did you do with my equipment!” She whirled on him, anger in her tone. Jack’s smugness washed away at that question. “What did I do? Nothing! I just wanted to show you that I was telling the truth when I told you about Chakra!”
“Bullshit!” She yelled. Her foot stomped on the floor. “Y-You must’ve done something to them! That’s why you wanted to have me do it again! So you can try and get me to believe this hogwash about Catra-” “Chakra.” “-whatever! Don’t mess with my equipment!”
His brows furrowed in frustration. “I didn’t do anything to them! You can check your equipment again, or whatever you do with it. You had your eyes on me the whole time, too! The only time you didn’t was when you took those X-Rays of me while in another room. How could I possibly mess with your equipment fast enough in the time you looked away?”
She sputtered, “Y-You, You d-did. I-I. Y-You…” She stomped her foot once more and pouted. “I made this equipment myself! I know it like the back of my hand. If you’re right and didn’t mess with it, then I’ll just take a look at it.” She gave a very strained smile. “You wouldn’t mind if I did look at it, right? If you didn’t do anything, then everything should still be there, yeah?”
Jack felt his confidence rise as he crossed his arms and smirked at her. “Yep,” he gave. “Go ahead. I haven’t done anything.” Her smile fell away. She promptly went and checked the machine. And, 20 minutes later, she came back into the room. “Follow me.” She ordered him with a dead voice.
So, they took more scans, and Jack used his Chakra in every one. Pol was in disbelief. “I, this is…” Jack once more had that smirk on his face. Finally! All those hoops he jumped through, and he finally managed to convince her.
Pol held her hand up to her mouth. “... I need to tell Dr. Til about this.” Jack was still standing there and smirking as he heard this, and watched as she scrambled with her desk. “So, do you believe me now?” He asked condescendingly.
She stopped what she was doing and turned to him. She snapped out, “Yes, you asshole, I do! Now, pipe down. I’m trying to write a letter to Dr. Bot Til at the East City University Hospital Clinic. He’s the one who’s been talking about some phenomenon about mysticism and the body and whatever. If I give your scans to him, maybe he’ll be able to tell us if this is anything similar to what he knows.”
And so, Dr. Pol En wrote a letter containing her appointment with Jack, but not his name, and what Jack revealed to her. With it was an envelope with the distorted scans of his Chakra usage.
Pol sent Jack off and waived his bill since she said that she would. She would then send her letter and the scans in the mail to be sent to East City. The mail train came in the morning, picked it up, and went on its route to East City.
Unfortunately, as the train was going across the Chilly Mountain, it all caught on fire. And by ‘it all’ this narrator means the entire mountain caught on fire. And it kept burning, and burning, and burning.
Later on, Chilly Mountain would be renamed Fry Pan Mountain, and the stories of Bandit King Ox would circulate the area, making travel difficult for all those who tried to get to East City from the rural area.
AN: Sorry about the short post, I should be able to make the next post longer, as it deals with all of the discoveries that Jack makes about Chakra.