Fic: The Dreamkeeper (Part I)
Mar. 14th, 2015 04:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
boxxsaltzTitle: The Dreamkeeper
Author: Boxxsaltz
Rating: PG-13
Pairing(s): Jessica Jung/TIffany Hwang
Summary: Before there was anything there was a dream
AN: Beta credit to Doucette/Douismain
Part I
Jessica played with her name badge that hung from a lanyard around her neck. It was glossy, gleaming off the lights in the elevator that whined and groaned against its wires as it ascended up past floors. A smile tugged at the corner of her mouth as she read off her name:
Jessica Jung
Dreamologist
Caretaker
It was a step up from the scribbled sharpie and lousy sticky nametags she had worn throughout her training. She was glad to leave those days behind, ridding of the mint green trainee scrubs in exchange for a navy blue lab coat and a plastic badge.
“Nice, isn’t it?”
Jessica looked up at Seohyun, her Senior Caretaker, blushing slightly. The elevator doors chimed open on the sixth floor and Seohyun motioned for Jessica to step out first. Falling into step just ahead of Jessica, she led them through the corridors of the Dream Bank Care Unit.
“You’ll check in here every morning,” Seohyun drew her attention to the front desk and kept moving. “Even if you stay over night, you’re required to check in by six the next morning at latest so we know you’re still on duty.”
The Care Unit was laid out like that of a tiny hotel. Two hallway sectors branched out on either side of the front desk. One was designed for permanent residence, two assigned to each room. Down the other hall sat the supply rooms, private doctor areas, offices, emergency rooms and rest centers for walk-ins to spend time of recovery
“Here is the recreation room…” Seohyun continued.
Inside the Rec Room played an old black and white movie for empty couches, tables, and chairs. In the corner, Jessica noted a wood chipped, upright piano stocked with wrinkled music, their edges dog-eared.
Rounding back from the tour, they passed a set of thick metal gray doors that sectioned off the Special Care Sector. Limited access was granted to only a handful of Caretakers that watched over Dreamkeepers who weren’t stable enough or needed extra care than those in the main Care Unit.
Jessica’s eyes lingered on the two, tiny windows cut into the doors filled with thick, bulletproof glass. All she could see was stark fluorescent white and gray.
“The break room,” Jessica’s attention was drawn back around. “We’ll talk in here.”
Seohyun slid her badge into the card reader. A green light flickered signaling their access and they stepped in. A few other Caretakers sat around, chatting quietly amongst themselves. They greeted Seohyun with bows and regarded Jessica with welcoming smiles as Seohyun introduced her.
“Take a seat. Would you like some coffee?”
“No, thank you.” Jessica sank into a chair at the table Seohyun moved to by a small window. In the entire sixth floor, it was the first window she had seen.
“We’ll start you off small,” from her clipboard, Seohyun unpinned a manila file folder. Excitement swam through Jessica as Seohyun cracked it open. “Go on. Take a look.”
The patient’s name was Choi Sooyoung. She was a Dreamkeeper of five years now rendered into a permanent and seemingly irreversible coma.
Jessica’s brow furrowed as she continued to read.
“From your training assessments your expertise are more suited for active patients, but this one will require you much attention.”
“Brain deterioration is serious.” She looked up.
“And something we’ve been trying to stop.”
Jessica nodded, looking back at the file. Her head tilted at the little Active next to her name. “I thought you said she wasn’t active?”
“By active, I meant literally. She isn’t responsive, but Miss Choi is still being used for extractions.”
Jessica cocked her eyebrow. “But extractions would only-”
“She’s more than capable of withstanding the procedures.” Seohyun cut her off. Jessica swallowed down her argument of how delicate the conditions were. “Besides, Sooyoung is one of our bests.”
Seohyun pushed on a small, sad smile but the action didn’t reach her eyes. Something in Jessica’s stomach gave a little twist but it quickly went away when she remembered who she was - that a badge was around her neck and a coat draped her shoulders.
“I’ll be happy to care for her, doctor.”
Seohyun’s smile widened, this time genuine. “Are you ready to meet her?”
-/-/-/-
Jessica was born into a world with no dreams. She had never known anything but.
Her father would tell her and her sister tales about them though he had even grown up in a time where dreams had become rare and died out in his late youth. Where her sister took them as tall-tales and fairy tales to be put to bed by, Jessica thought of them as delicious little pieces of past that needed to be excavated and discovered.
The idea of seeing pictures in your mind while sleeping was foreign. It was laughable - until she was old enough to understand.
“If there are no more dreams, why do we have Dream Banks?” She had asked her father when she was younger.
She learned then that there were still a few people out there - Dreamkeepers as they were called - who could dream. Their lives were like treasured gold and their dreams were anything but priceless.
The generations before wanted dreams back for reasons like hope and happiness and fantasy. They wanted to live their highs of the day while they were tucked in at night. They wanted to relive old memories while curled up with loved ones and replay the things they saw in the break of dawn’s sun.
Jessica learned of the workings of the Dream Bank then. Those large facilities in the business of extracting dreams from those who still could and supplying them to the public by way of injection.
If you had the money for it.
The entire thing made Jessica curious. While her sister held onto just the thought and ideas and fanciful illusions of a seemingly dead pastime, Jessica dove into it.
She studied it, learning what all went in to acquire these dreams. What was so great about them and what made people rush in and out, spending countless amounts of money on a daily basis just to get one?
She hadn’t known in grade school what she was really getting herself into. Even through her training at the facilities, she still wasn’t completely aware.
But, as she made her way down the hall to her first patient’s room, maybe she’d soon figure out what this all was about and why so many would go mad over it all.
-/-/-/-
Watching Sooyoung was simple.
Her room was quiet and empty. Only a bed, a chair, a nightstand, and a cluster of machines she was hooked up to. Jessica checked them tri-hourly as she was required, noting down every detail:
Vitals: Stable
Charts: Good Standing
Progress: Undefined
Her job as Caretaker was to look after the Dreamkeepers. From the ones on contract who came in every week to offer their dreams up, to the ones who lived there permanently, shuffling around the halls and talking with each other like an entirely different sect of being.
Every twelve hours, half of the Dreamkeepers were taken down to the third floor Extraction Sector and brought back up to be switched out with the others. Jessica watched the other Caretakers disappear with them and come back. Except for her and Sooyoung. Her schedule was different. They remained here, in this room, in beep, beep, beep-beep silence until -
“Nurse Jung?”
Jessica looked up from where she sat on a chair beside Sooyoung’s bed. At the door stood the two usual Extractors in their white coats. She followed after them as they wheeled Sooyoung through the hall and into the elevator. The three never talked. People didn’t seem to talk much on the third of sixth floor.
Standing back, Jessica watched as Sooyoung disappeared into one of the Extraction Rooms full of machines. The door closed tight once they were inside. Only the Extractors were allowed eyewitness to the procedures.
Taking a seat on a bench across the hall, Jessica took a rubik's cube from her pocket and began to turn the sides. The click, click, clicks of the blocks sliding against one another was the only thing that kept her sane in such a silent hall where only air condition hummed and pads of feet patted quickly and softly along the polished concrete.
“I hate those.” The silence was pierced by a rough, husky voice. “I would get so close to finishing but I’d always wake up before I could.”
Jessica looked over to see a woman dressed in a gray gown with black, disheveled hair and pallid skin leaning against the wall.
When she spoke, her scratchy voice was like cotton balls laced with tiny thorns on Jessica’s ears. “I don’t remember how many times I had that dream. It used to drive me crazy until they took it away.”
The pale skin should’ve been the first indicator. All of the Dreamkeepers seemed to be slightly drained of color and their eyes always looked glossier than normal.
From the cuff of her gown sleeve, Jessica saw the bluish-purple bruising of where needles would’ve been inserted for IVs and the like. Without even having to see, Jessica knew two, large, discolored scars were on the back of her neck where the extracting needles would be pierced into.
That head of black hair lolled against the wall so glazed eyes met Jessica’s. A lazy tongue smoothed over dry cracking lips and Jessica noted the dark circles under her eyes.
Jessica couldn’t help thinking, despite the ghastly traces of what this woman’s purpose had left on her, she was still undeniably beautiful.
“Have you ever cracked it?” She asked, nodding to the cube. Jessica shook her head. The woman’s head tilted, brow furrowing. Her eyes blinked in sudden confusion. “Do I...know you?”
“There she is. Tiffany!”
The girl's head snapped over. An Extractor came hurriedly down the hall with a Caretaker Jessica had never seen. They closed in on Tiffany both angry and relieved. Jessica didn’t miss the way Tiffany’s face paled another shade.
“I’m sorry, doctor.” Tiffany muttered.
“What did I tell you about running off?” Asked her Caretaker, his eyes sharp and brow threaded together.
“I’m sorry, I won’t do it again.”
He took her by the arm, ripping her off the wall. “Let’s go.”
Tiffany nearly tripped over her feet as she was dragged away. Jessica watched them walk to an Extraction Room further down the hall. The door flew open and Tiffany was pushed inside with one last fleeting look at Jessica.
“You can take her back up.” Said one of the Extractors who had taken Sooyoung. Jessica got up and bowed as they left to attend to something else.
Taking hold of the rails on Sooyoung’s bed, Jessica started for the elevator.
-/-/-/-
Licking her thumb, Jessica flipped a page in her binder thick with notes. She sat alone, tucked beneath the square window in the break room. Crumbs fell from the croissant she chewed onto the pages. She quickly blew them away before turning another page and rubbed the back of her sore neck with her free hand.
“Long night?”
She looked up seeing Seohyun drop into the opposite seat. She pulled out a lunch container neatly packed and sorted.
“Weeks of training spent sleeping on those bunks and I’m still not used to it.”
Seohyun hummed. “Sooyoung’s not going to walk out of here. Go home for the weekend.”
Jessica nodded at that. It felt sort of wrong to leave her patient, but maybe she would take some time out. Her plants in her apartment were probably already dying from neglect.
Flipping another page, Jessica read down a list of names. “Is this the full roster of Dreamkeepers?”
Seohyun leaned forward to see the list. “Looks like it.”
“Is it the most updated?”
“Look here,” Seohyun pointed a the print date at the bottom of the page. It indicated the update had just been a few days ago. “Why?”
Jessica shook her head, letting her eyes read over names again. Three read-throughs, she never found the name Tiffany on the list.
“Should I call in a second watch while I’m out?”
Seohyun shook her head, biting into a carrot. “There will always be staff to attend to her if anything goes wrong. And I’ll be here.”
Jessica closed her binder and got up with a bow.
“Make sure to turn in your end week reports to the front desk before you go.”
Wiggling the reports from a pocket in her binder, she passed them to a receptionist who waited to make copies for each of them to have.
Just over the counter, Jessica’s eyes found the sixth floor map taped behind the desk by one of the phones. Extension numbers for the different rooms were printed next to letter indicators that matched their corresponding rooms.
A: Rm. 600, Ext: 8498
B: Rm. 601, Ext 8494
C: Rm. –
Squinting, she got to the bottom of the second list where double letters took over beneath a label for the Special Care Sector.
“Nurse Jung?”
“Thank you.” Jessica smiled, taking the copied reports and started off the down the hall.
Before she turned the corner, a figure caught her eye headed for the double gray doors of the Special Care Sector at the farthest end of the hall. The Caretaker Jessica had seen handling Tiffany from days before slid his badge into the card reader.
The bolts in the doors unlocked with a clack and he stepped inside. Just as the door clicked shut, Jessica swore she heard a scream emit from the corridor.
But maybe that was the wind playing tricks on her.
-/-/-/-
Code Yellow. Code yellow.
Jessica burst into Sooyoung’s room. Her machines were firing off erratic while her body convulsed in her bed.
Jessica fought through her groggy state of mind that was still trying to cling onto the pillow it had been wrenched from back at home and thrust into a world of lab coats and an eye watering, sterile stench.
Three other doctors hovered about. Jessica pushed through them.
“Status?”
“She lapsed into fits two hours after extraction.”
Jessica read off numbers and color indicators, mind matching them to their meanings. “I need a stabilizer. Help me strap her arms and legs down.”
Two doctors moved to pull the straps from beneath the bed while the other searched for the needed syringe.
A shrilling tone took to the air. Jessica checked Sooyoung’s vitals.
“We’re going to need an IV. Standard.” Taking the syringe, Jessica gripped Sooyoung’s chin, forcing her head to the side. She stabbed it into the tender wounds on the back of her neck and pushed the pink tinted liquid into her veins.
Stepping back, she watched as the doctors hooked needles into her arms. Sooyoung’s body relaxed slowly until she laid calmly against the mattress.
Machines stopped their haywire screeching but didn’t go completely back to normal. Jessica felt her stomach knot up. Something was wrong.
“Everyone out,” Jessica ordered. “Out.”
She waited for the room to clear before she approached the side of Sooyoung’s bed. Her fingers smoothed along sweat glossed skin, feeling its sticky texture against thin, feathery skin. She looked too pale, blue veins standing out with hints of dark violet. Rolled back eyes were opened to slits showing a sliver of the whites tainted with red.
Pushing Sooyoung’s head over, Jessica examined the bruising left by extracting needles. One had started to bleed.
Jessica pursed her lips.
-/-/-/-
“Doctor, can I have a word with -”
Jessica stopped, eyes shifting from Seohyun to the Caretaker sitting in her office. Jessica’s eyes lingered on him a moment, taking in his now familiar face.
“I’m sorry,” Jessica bowed, backing out. “Excuse me.”
“Wait,” Seohyun leaned forward, closing a file folder on her desk. “What do you need? I heard there was a problem with Sooyoung?”
Jessica’s jaw tightened. “The past Extraction Procedure. Why was it conducted without my authorization?”
Seohyun’s face fell. She turned to the Caretaker across from her. “You can go, Seunghyun. We’ll finish our chat later.”
Seunghyun left without a word. Jessica followed the tip of Seohyun’s head to the chair previously occupied.
“I authorized it.”
“We knew the risk was too high.” Jessica fumed.
“We work in a field of risks, Nurse Jung. What did you expect?”
Jessica felt heat rise up along the back of her neck. “She was my patient, doctor.”
Seohyun sighed. She leaned back with the ghost of a frown on her mouth.
“You’ve studied this field. You know how dangerous and risky what we do can be, but you have to remember we are in a business here.” Seohyun found her gaze. “For people like Sooyoung, she is a high demand product - one of our best that I entrusted you to. The consequence was predicted but unforeseen on the outcome.”
Jessica felt that familiar wave of unease swim through her gut. “I don’t think I understand what you mean.”
“What I’m saying, Jessica,” Seohyun stood, taking the file off her desk and crossed to a cabinet. “Sooyoung has only been kept alive because of the dreams she possesses. She enlisted herself into this Bank and into our care knowingly. Her time will soon come to an end and maybe it is just that time.”
Jessica’s eyes followed Seohyun back to her seat. “So you know she probably won’t survive another Extraction?”
Seohyun remained silent, hands tucked beneath her chin. Jessica didn’t have to be told to know this was the end of the conversation.
“I’ll see myself out.”
“I hand picked you out of hundreds, Nurse Jung,” Seohyun said just as Jessica made it for the door. “Don’t let this one mishap rattle you. Sooyoung is only one patient. You’re meant to work with much finer.”
Swallowing the disgust of Seohyun’s tone, Jessica bowed. “Thank you, doctor.”
“Get some sleep.”
-/-/-/-
She stayed with Sooyoung through the night, lounged in a stiff chair with paperwork and books. Jessica had only leaned her head back against the wall to rest her eyes a minute when she slipped into sleep.
A dull humming sound entered the darkness of her slumber, growing sharper and sharper until the tunes of a song played melodically into her ears. The sound of it almost lulled her back to sleep when-
THWAK!
Jessica jolted awake, sitting up in her chair. The papers in her lap were scattered across the floor along with the book that had slipped off and woken her up.
“Hi.”
Jessica blinked up from her documents to the person standing next to Sooyoung’s bed. Rubbing sleep from her eyes, Tiffany came into static focus. She was dressed the same as before: gray gown, feet bare, and black hair framing her pretty face in a sort of organized, tangled mess.
Jessica straightened up, running a hand through her own light brown hair to tame it. “Hi.”
Tiffany grinned in a way that turned her eyes into crescents.
“Does Seunghyun know you’re here?”
Tiffany’s face changed at the mention of her Caretaker. “What he doesn’t know is out is still in.”
“What're you doing here?”
“They don’t like us to have friends,” turning to Sooyoung, her voice sounded almost wistful as she looked over the bedridden girl, “but they don’t call you friends if one of you can’t talk.”
“Do you know her?”
Tiffany nodded. Her fingers smoothed over Sooyoung’s face gently, tracing patterns along her cheeks, her forehead, between her eyes. “Sooyoung was always too smart for the doctors. We got into so much trouble together.” She laughed, leaning down to speak low into Sooyoung’s ear. “Do you remember, Youngie?”
She giggled, ear hovering over Sooyoung’s mouth as if she would speak back. Jessica didn’t know what to think of it though she knew what her training told her. Let it be. No two Dreamkeepers were as sane as the next.
“You’re not from the Care Unit,” said Jessica.
Tiffany shook her head. She moved her finger around in the air, drawing the letters as she said them. “S. C. S.”
“Special Care Sector?”
“Ding, ding, ding.”
“How did you get out?”
She shrugged. “The same way they get in. Through the door.”
“But how?”
Tiffany smirked, finger held up to her lip. “Shhh.”
She grinned something sickeningly unsettling. Jessica distracted herself from it by bending over to pick up her papers. The appearance of a second pair of hands took her aback. Her eyes shifted up to see Tiffany crouched on the floor, helping her collect the mess.
“When Sooyoung’s gone, will you be my friend?”
“Huh?” Jessica quickly took the documents from Tiffany’s hand and shoved them into a folder.
Tiffany pouted, sinking to sit flat on the floor. Pulling up her legs, she wrapped her arms around them staring up at Jessica with wide, glossy eyes.
“The other doctors - they don’t like to hear me talk,” her hand lifted to her mouth, shielding it on one side as she whispered, “but they love it when I dream.”
“You must be special.”
Tiffany’s face changed instantly. Her smile left and her eyes turned distant. If Jessica didn’t know any better she’d say she saw fear in Tiffany’s face. But she had been trained to be passive, to look over those things, to not involve herself into the personal matters of the Dreamkeepers. Especially if they weren’t in her care.
“Take care of Sooyoung?” Tiffany asked, voice small.
“That is my job.”
Tiffany nodded, pushing herself from the floor. Jessica watched her skip to Sooyoung’s bed where she kissed her forehead. “Jessica’s here now. I’m going back.”
Jessica blinked at the mention of her name. Her eyes remained fixed on Tiffany who skipped over to her and pressed the same, gentle kiss onto Jessica’s head.
“Bye.” Tiffany laughed at the shock on Jessica’s face before she slipped out the door.
Jessica sat back, fingers pressed to the cold place on her forehead.
None of her training prepared her for this.
-/-/-/-
“How’s the Dream Bank?”
Jessica thanked the waiter as he placed their food onto the table. She passed the salt to her sister’s waiting hand and picked up her fork.
“Bleak.”
Krystal snorted. “That’s ironic.”
It was sort of ironic for her to be working in a profession that gave people the bliss they wanted while behind those scrubbed, white walls things were undisputably drab.
“When’s the big case?” Jessica asked. Work was the last thing she wanted to talk about now that she had been able to catch a couple hours out.
“A couple weeks.” Krystal took a drink of her tea. “My professor trusts me to carry most of it. He thinks we’ll win.”
Jessica nodded, shoving food into her mouth. Food at work paled extremely in comparison. She barely heard any of what Krystal had to say about Law School and thesis projects as she ate. Her manners failed her as she chewed sloppily. Krystal handed her a napkin.
“You look tired.”
Jessica sighed, placing the napkin aside. “My patient is dying so I’ve been on duty round clock.”
“Isn’t that the opposite of what you’re supposed to do?”
“It happens,” as Seohyun reminded her. As machine charts reminded her everyday. “Her body’s too weak to keep up with the extractions. If we’re lucky, she’ll pass quickly and silently.”
“That does sound bleak.” Krystal deadpanned.
“And courthouses don’t?”
“I’m helping people get their justice.”
“And I’m helping people sleep happily at night.”
Krystal laughed, letting their conversation fall silent there. Jessica’s mind shifted away from the restaurant back to Sooyoung’s room. She really could think of nothing else, and ever since she had woken to Tiffany hovering over Sooyoung’s bed, Jessica couldn’t push those glossy eyes and wide smiles from her mind either.
It brought up tiny questions in the back of Jessica’s mind. Ones like the kind she had when she was a little kid, sitting on her dad’s lap and asking him about dreams. What was so great about them?
“Krystal?”
“Hmm?” She slurped, getting a drop on her chin. Jessica smirked, handing over a napkin.
“Have you ever gotten a dream?”
She shook her head, brow tugging in as she cleaned her mouth. “No.”
Jessica sat back, her mind now lost in thought. “Me neither.”
-/-/-/-
Jessica’s eyes fluttered where she stood, staring into Sooyoung’s room.
It was empty.
“Come to my office, please.” Seohyun spoke distinctly and softly behind her.
Jessica tore her eyes from the sterile space and followed Seohyun’s steps down the hall and into her office where sat down in a chair across from Seohyun.
“This is how things work around here. You know that.”
“I do.”
“Good.” Seohyun placed a large file envelope onto the desk. Jessica didn’t have to be told that it was meant for her to take and open. “We would never move anyone of rookie status to this level of jurisdiction so suddenly, but personal lives can interfere and we’re understaffed up here as it is.”
Opening the folder, she blinked at the name: Tiffany Hwang.
Jessica looked up. “Doesn’t she have a Caretaker?”
“Seunghyun will no longer be working at this facility,” Seohyun explained, cryptically. “You’ll train aside him for the days leading up to his leave. I’ve assured everyone in the SCS that you’re suited for the job.”
“If you believe so, doctor.” Jessica felt a nervous lump drop into her stomach.
Seohyun smirked. “I do.”
Jessica bowed before leaving the office with the file tucked securely at her side. She was headed for the elevators when a scream clawed at her ears just as she rounded a corner and her stomach dropped.
Following the shouts, Jessica found herself walking up the familiar hallway to where Sooyoung’s empty room was. In front of it she found Tiffany, arms and legs flailing against doctors fighting to restrain her.
“Sooyoung!” She screamed, tears leaking down her face. “Sooyoung! No!”
Seunghyun appeared in a flash, syringe in hand. Tiffany saw it and started struggling more, yelling for mercy as he closed in.
“Hold her!” He demanded.
Tiffany let out a cry as she was forced up against a wall and pinned there. Seunghyun worked swiftly, fighting passed Tiffany’s struggles to stab the needle into the side of her neck.
In a matter of seconds, she went limp with the sedation. The doctors picked her up in their arms as if she weighed nothing and hauled her off down the hall.
Jessica watched them go, her throat tightening up and blood running cold as the echo of Tiffany’s scream replayed itself in her mind.
Part II
-
Author: Boxxsaltz
Rating: PG-13
Pairing(s): Jessica Jung/TIffany Hwang
Summary: Before there was anything there was a dream
AN: Beta credit to Doucette/Douismain
Part I
Jessica played with her name badge that hung from a lanyard around her neck. It was glossy, gleaming off the lights in the elevator that whined and groaned against its wires as it ascended up past floors. A smile tugged at the corner of her mouth as she read off her name:
Jessica Jung
Dreamologist
Caretaker
It was a step up from the scribbled sharpie and lousy sticky nametags she had worn throughout her training. She was glad to leave those days behind, ridding of the mint green trainee scrubs in exchange for a navy blue lab coat and a plastic badge.
“Nice, isn’t it?”
Jessica looked up at Seohyun, her Senior Caretaker, blushing slightly. The elevator doors chimed open on the sixth floor and Seohyun motioned for Jessica to step out first. Falling into step just ahead of Jessica, she led them through the corridors of the Dream Bank Care Unit.
“You’ll check in here every morning,” Seohyun drew her attention to the front desk and kept moving. “Even if you stay over night, you’re required to check in by six the next morning at latest so we know you’re still on duty.”
The Care Unit was laid out like that of a tiny hotel. Two hallway sectors branched out on either side of the front desk. One was designed for permanent residence, two assigned to each room. Down the other hall sat the supply rooms, private doctor areas, offices, emergency rooms and rest centers for walk-ins to spend time of recovery
“Here is the recreation room…” Seohyun continued.
Inside the Rec Room played an old black and white movie for empty couches, tables, and chairs. In the corner, Jessica noted a wood chipped, upright piano stocked with wrinkled music, their edges dog-eared.
Rounding back from the tour, they passed a set of thick metal gray doors that sectioned off the Special Care Sector. Limited access was granted to only a handful of Caretakers that watched over Dreamkeepers who weren’t stable enough or needed extra care than those in the main Care Unit.
Jessica’s eyes lingered on the two, tiny windows cut into the doors filled with thick, bulletproof glass. All she could see was stark fluorescent white and gray.
“The break room,” Jessica’s attention was drawn back around. “We’ll talk in here.”
Seohyun slid her badge into the card reader. A green light flickered signaling their access and they stepped in. A few other Caretakers sat around, chatting quietly amongst themselves. They greeted Seohyun with bows and regarded Jessica with welcoming smiles as Seohyun introduced her.
“Take a seat. Would you like some coffee?”
“No, thank you.” Jessica sank into a chair at the table Seohyun moved to by a small window. In the entire sixth floor, it was the first window she had seen.
“We’ll start you off small,” from her clipboard, Seohyun unpinned a manila file folder. Excitement swam through Jessica as Seohyun cracked it open. “Go on. Take a look.”
The patient’s name was Choi Sooyoung. She was a Dreamkeeper of five years now rendered into a permanent and seemingly irreversible coma.
Jessica’s brow furrowed as she continued to read.
“From your training assessments your expertise are more suited for active patients, but this one will require you much attention.”
“Brain deterioration is serious.” She looked up.
“And something we’ve been trying to stop.”
Jessica nodded, looking back at the file. Her head tilted at the little Active next to her name. “I thought you said she wasn’t active?”
“By active, I meant literally. She isn’t responsive, but Miss Choi is still being used for extractions.”
Jessica cocked her eyebrow. “But extractions would only-”
“She’s more than capable of withstanding the procedures.” Seohyun cut her off. Jessica swallowed down her argument of how delicate the conditions were. “Besides, Sooyoung is one of our bests.”
Seohyun pushed on a small, sad smile but the action didn’t reach her eyes. Something in Jessica’s stomach gave a little twist but it quickly went away when she remembered who she was - that a badge was around her neck and a coat draped her shoulders.
“I’ll be happy to care for her, doctor.”
Seohyun’s smile widened, this time genuine. “Are you ready to meet her?”
-/-/-/-
Jessica was born into a world with no dreams. She had never known anything but.
Her father would tell her and her sister tales about them though he had even grown up in a time where dreams had become rare and died out in his late youth. Where her sister took them as tall-tales and fairy tales to be put to bed by, Jessica thought of them as delicious little pieces of past that needed to be excavated and discovered.
The idea of seeing pictures in your mind while sleeping was foreign. It was laughable - until she was old enough to understand.
“If there are no more dreams, why do we have Dream Banks?” She had asked her father when she was younger.
She learned then that there were still a few people out there - Dreamkeepers as they were called - who could dream. Their lives were like treasured gold and their dreams were anything but priceless.
The generations before wanted dreams back for reasons like hope and happiness and fantasy. They wanted to live their highs of the day while they were tucked in at night. They wanted to relive old memories while curled up with loved ones and replay the things they saw in the break of dawn’s sun.
Jessica learned of the workings of the Dream Bank then. Those large facilities in the business of extracting dreams from those who still could and supplying them to the public by way of injection.
If you had the money for it.
The entire thing made Jessica curious. While her sister held onto just the thought and ideas and fanciful illusions of a seemingly dead pastime, Jessica dove into it.
She studied it, learning what all went in to acquire these dreams. What was so great about them and what made people rush in and out, spending countless amounts of money on a daily basis just to get one?
She hadn’t known in grade school what she was really getting herself into. Even through her training at the facilities, she still wasn’t completely aware.
But, as she made her way down the hall to her first patient’s room, maybe she’d soon figure out what this all was about and why so many would go mad over it all.
-/-/-/-
Watching Sooyoung was simple.
Her room was quiet and empty. Only a bed, a chair, a nightstand, and a cluster of machines she was hooked up to. Jessica checked them tri-hourly as she was required, noting down every detail:
Vitals: Stable
Charts: Good Standing
Progress: Undefined
Her job as Caretaker was to look after the Dreamkeepers. From the ones on contract who came in every week to offer their dreams up, to the ones who lived there permanently, shuffling around the halls and talking with each other like an entirely different sect of being.
Every twelve hours, half of the Dreamkeepers were taken down to the third floor Extraction Sector and brought back up to be switched out with the others. Jessica watched the other Caretakers disappear with them and come back. Except for her and Sooyoung. Her schedule was different. They remained here, in this room, in beep, beep, beep-beep silence until -
“Nurse Jung?”
Jessica looked up from where she sat on a chair beside Sooyoung’s bed. At the door stood the two usual Extractors in their white coats. She followed after them as they wheeled Sooyoung through the hall and into the elevator. The three never talked. People didn’t seem to talk much on the third of sixth floor.
Standing back, Jessica watched as Sooyoung disappeared into one of the Extraction Rooms full of machines. The door closed tight once they were inside. Only the Extractors were allowed eyewitness to the procedures.
Taking a seat on a bench across the hall, Jessica took a rubik's cube from her pocket and began to turn the sides. The click, click, clicks of the blocks sliding against one another was the only thing that kept her sane in such a silent hall where only air condition hummed and pads of feet patted quickly and softly along the polished concrete.
“I hate those.” The silence was pierced by a rough, husky voice. “I would get so close to finishing but I’d always wake up before I could.”
Jessica looked over to see a woman dressed in a gray gown with black, disheveled hair and pallid skin leaning against the wall.
When she spoke, her scratchy voice was like cotton balls laced with tiny thorns on Jessica’s ears. “I don’t remember how many times I had that dream. It used to drive me crazy until they took it away.”
The pale skin should’ve been the first indicator. All of the Dreamkeepers seemed to be slightly drained of color and their eyes always looked glossier than normal.
From the cuff of her gown sleeve, Jessica saw the bluish-purple bruising of where needles would’ve been inserted for IVs and the like. Without even having to see, Jessica knew two, large, discolored scars were on the back of her neck where the extracting needles would be pierced into.
That head of black hair lolled against the wall so glazed eyes met Jessica’s. A lazy tongue smoothed over dry cracking lips and Jessica noted the dark circles under her eyes.
Jessica couldn’t help thinking, despite the ghastly traces of what this woman’s purpose had left on her, she was still undeniably beautiful.
“Have you ever cracked it?” She asked, nodding to the cube. Jessica shook her head. The woman’s head tilted, brow furrowing. Her eyes blinked in sudden confusion. “Do I...know you?”
“There she is. Tiffany!”
The girl's head snapped over. An Extractor came hurriedly down the hall with a Caretaker Jessica had never seen. They closed in on Tiffany both angry and relieved. Jessica didn’t miss the way Tiffany’s face paled another shade.
“I’m sorry, doctor.” Tiffany muttered.
“What did I tell you about running off?” Asked her Caretaker, his eyes sharp and brow threaded together.
“I’m sorry, I won’t do it again.”
He took her by the arm, ripping her off the wall. “Let’s go.”
Tiffany nearly tripped over her feet as she was dragged away. Jessica watched them walk to an Extraction Room further down the hall. The door flew open and Tiffany was pushed inside with one last fleeting look at Jessica.
“You can take her back up.” Said one of the Extractors who had taken Sooyoung. Jessica got up and bowed as they left to attend to something else.
Taking hold of the rails on Sooyoung’s bed, Jessica started for the elevator.
-/-/-/-
Licking her thumb, Jessica flipped a page in her binder thick with notes. She sat alone, tucked beneath the square window in the break room. Crumbs fell from the croissant she chewed onto the pages. She quickly blew them away before turning another page and rubbed the back of her sore neck with her free hand.
“Long night?”
She looked up seeing Seohyun drop into the opposite seat. She pulled out a lunch container neatly packed and sorted.
“Weeks of training spent sleeping on those bunks and I’m still not used to it.”
Seohyun hummed. “Sooyoung’s not going to walk out of here. Go home for the weekend.”
Jessica nodded at that. It felt sort of wrong to leave her patient, but maybe she would take some time out. Her plants in her apartment were probably already dying from neglect.
Flipping another page, Jessica read down a list of names. “Is this the full roster of Dreamkeepers?”
Seohyun leaned forward to see the list. “Looks like it.”
“Is it the most updated?”
“Look here,” Seohyun pointed a the print date at the bottom of the page. It indicated the update had just been a few days ago. “Why?”
Jessica shook her head, letting her eyes read over names again. Three read-throughs, she never found the name Tiffany on the list.
“Should I call in a second watch while I’m out?”
Seohyun shook her head, biting into a carrot. “There will always be staff to attend to her if anything goes wrong. And I’ll be here.”
Jessica closed her binder and got up with a bow.
“Make sure to turn in your end week reports to the front desk before you go.”
Wiggling the reports from a pocket in her binder, she passed them to a receptionist who waited to make copies for each of them to have.
Just over the counter, Jessica’s eyes found the sixth floor map taped behind the desk by one of the phones. Extension numbers for the different rooms were printed next to letter indicators that matched their corresponding rooms.
A: Rm. 600, Ext: 8498
B: Rm. 601, Ext 8494
C: Rm. –
Squinting, she got to the bottom of the second list where double letters took over beneath a label for the Special Care Sector.
“Nurse Jung?”
“Thank you.” Jessica smiled, taking the copied reports and started off the down the hall.
Before she turned the corner, a figure caught her eye headed for the double gray doors of the Special Care Sector at the farthest end of the hall. The Caretaker Jessica had seen handling Tiffany from days before slid his badge into the card reader.
The bolts in the doors unlocked with a clack and he stepped inside. Just as the door clicked shut, Jessica swore she heard a scream emit from the corridor.
But maybe that was the wind playing tricks on her.
-/-/-/-
Code Yellow. Code yellow.
Jessica burst into Sooyoung’s room. Her machines were firing off erratic while her body convulsed in her bed.
Jessica fought through her groggy state of mind that was still trying to cling onto the pillow it had been wrenched from back at home and thrust into a world of lab coats and an eye watering, sterile stench.
Three other doctors hovered about. Jessica pushed through them.
“Status?”
“She lapsed into fits two hours after extraction.”
Jessica read off numbers and color indicators, mind matching them to their meanings. “I need a stabilizer. Help me strap her arms and legs down.”
Two doctors moved to pull the straps from beneath the bed while the other searched for the needed syringe.
A shrilling tone took to the air. Jessica checked Sooyoung’s vitals.
“We’re going to need an IV. Standard.” Taking the syringe, Jessica gripped Sooyoung’s chin, forcing her head to the side. She stabbed it into the tender wounds on the back of her neck and pushed the pink tinted liquid into her veins.
Stepping back, she watched as the doctors hooked needles into her arms. Sooyoung’s body relaxed slowly until she laid calmly against the mattress.
Machines stopped their haywire screeching but didn’t go completely back to normal. Jessica felt her stomach knot up. Something was wrong.
“Everyone out,” Jessica ordered. “Out.”
She waited for the room to clear before she approached the side of Sooyoung’s bed. Her fingers smoothed along sweat glossed skin, feeling its sticky texture against thin, feathery skin. She looked too pale, blue veins standing out with hints of dark violet. Rolled back eyes were opened to slits showing a sliver of the whites tainted with red.
Pushing Sooyoung’s head over, Jessica examined the bruising left by extracting needles. One had started to bleed.
Jessica pursed her lips.
-/-/-/-
“Doctor, can I have a word with -”
Jessica stopped, eyes shifting from Seohyun to the Caretaker sitting in her office. Jessica’s eyes lingered on him a moment, taking in his now familiar face.
“I’m sorry,” Jessica bowed, backing out. “Excuse me.”
“Wait,” Seohyun leaned forward, closing a file folder on her desk. “What do you need? I heard there was a problem with Sooyoung?”
Jessica’s jaw tightened. “The past Extraction Procedure. Why was it conducted without my authorization?”
Seohyun’s face fell. She turned to the Caretaker across from her. “You can go, Seunghyun. We’ll finish our chat later.”
Seunghyun left without a word. Jessica followed the tip of Seohyun’s head to the chair previously occupied.
“I authorized it.”
“We knew the risk was too high.” Jessica fumed.
“We work in a field of risks, Nurse Jung. What did you expect?”
Jessica felt heat rise up along the back of her neck. “She was my patient, doctor.”
Seohyun sighed. She leaned back with the ghost of a frown on her mouth.
“You’ve studied this field. You know how dangerous and risky what we do can be, but you have to remember we are in a business here.” Seohyun found her gaze. “For people like Sooyoung, she is a high demand product - one of our best that I entrusted you to. The consequence was predicted but unforeseen on the outcome.”
Jessica felt that familiar wave of unease swim through her gut. “I don’t think I understand what you mean.”
“What I’m saying, Jessica,” Seohyun stood, taking the file off her desk and crossed to a cabinet. “Sooyoung has only been kept alive because of the dreams she possesses. She enlisted herself into this Bank and into our care knowingly. Her time will soon come to an end and maybe it is just that time.”
Jessica’s eyes followed Seohyun back to her seat. “So you know she probably won’t survive another Extraction?”
Seohyun remained silent, hands tucked beneath her chin. Jessica didn’t have to be told to know this was the end of the conversation.
“I’ll see myself out.”
“I hand picked you out of hundreds, Nurse Jung,” Seohyun said just as Jessica made it for the door. “Don’t let this one mishap rattle you. Sooyoung is only one patient. You’re meant to work with much finer.”
Swallowing the disgust of Seohyun’s tone, Jessica bowed. “Thank you, doctor.”
“Get some sleep.”
-/-/-/-
She stayed with Sooyoung through the night, lounged in a stiff chair with paperwork and books. Jessica had only leaned her head back against the wall to rest her eyes a minute when she slipped into sleep.
A dull humming sound entered the darkness of her slumber, growing sharper and sharper until the tunes of a song played melodically into her ears. The sound of it almost lulled her back to sleep when-
THWAK!
Jessica jolted awake, sitting up in her chair. The papers in her lap were scattered across the floor along with the book that had slipped off and woken her up.
“Hi.”
Jessica blinked up from her documents to the person standing next to Sooyoung’s bed. Rubbing sleep from her eyes, Tiffany came into static focus. She was dressed the same as before: gray gown, feet bare, and black hair framing her pretty face in a sort of organized, tangled mess.
Jessica straightened up, running a hand through her own light brown hair to tame it. “Hi.”
Tiffany grinned in a way that turned her eyes into crescents.
“Does Seunghyun know you’re here?”
Tiffany’s face changed at the mention of her Caretaker. “What he doesn’t know is out is still in.”
“What're you doing here?”
“They don’t like us to have friends,” turning to Sooyoung, her voice sounded almost wistful as she looked over the bedridden girl, “but they don’t call you friends if one of you can’t talk.”
“Do you know her?”
Tiffany nodded. Her fingers smoothed over Sooyoung’s face gently, tracing patterns along her cheeks, her forehead, between her eyes. “Sooyoung was always too smart for the doctors. We got into so much trouble together.” She laughed, leaning down to speak low into Sooyoung’s ear. “Do you remember, Youngie?”
She giggled, ear hovering over Sooyoung’s mouth as if she would speak back. Jessica didn’t know what to think of it though she knew what her training told her. Let it be. No two Dreamkeepers were as sane as the next.
“You’re not from the Care Unit,” said Jessica.
Tiffany shook her head. She moved her finger around in the air, drawing the letters as she said them. “S. C. S.”
“Special Care Sector?”
“Ding, ding, ding.”
“How did you get out?”
She shrugged. “The same way they get in. Through the door.”
“But how?”
Tiffany smirked, finger held up to her lip. “Shhh.”
She grinned something sickeningly unsettling. Jessica distracted herself from it by bending over to pick up her papers. The appearance of a second pair of hands took her aback. Her eyes shifted up to see Tiffany crouched on the floor, helping her collect the mess.
“When Sooyoung’s gone, will you be my friend?”
“Huh?” Jessica quickly took the documents from Tiffany’s hand and shoved them into a folder.
Tiffany pouted, sinking to sit flat on the floor. Pulling up her legs, she wrapped her arms around them staring up at Jessica with wide, glossy eyes.
“The other doctors - they don’t like to hear me talk,” her hand lifted to her mouth, shielding it on one side as she whispered, “but they love it when I dream.”
“You must be special.”
Tiffany’s face changed instantly. Her smile left and her eyes turned distant. If Jessica didn’t know any better she’d say she saw fear in Tiffany’s face. But she had been trained to be passive, to look over those things, to not involve herself into the personal matters of the Dreamkeepers. Especially if they weren’t in her care.
“Take care of Sooyoung?” Tiffany asked, voice small.
“That is my job.”
Tiffany nodded, pushing herself from the floor. Jessica watched her skip to Sooyoung’s bed where she kissed her forehead. “Jessica’s here now. I’m going back.”
Jessica blinked at the mention of her name. Her eyes remained fixed on Tiffany who skipped over to her and pressed the same, gentle kiss onto Jessica’s head.
“Bye.” Tiffany laughed at the shock on Jessica’s face before she slipped out the door.
Jessica sat back, fingers pressed to the cold place on her forehead.
None of her training prepared her for this.
-/-/-/-
“How’s the Dream Bank?”
Jessica thanked the waiter as he placed their food onto the table. She passed the salt to her sister’s waiting hand and picked up her fork.
“Bleak.”
Krystal snorted. “That’s ironic.”
It was sort of ironic for her to be working in a profession that gave people the bliss they wanted while behind those scrubbed, white walls things were undisputably drab.
“When’s the big case?” Jessica asked. Work was the last thing she wanted to talk about now that she had been able to catch a couple hours out.
“A couple weeks.” Krystal took a drink of her tea. “My professor trusts me to carry most of it. He thinks we’ll win.”
Jessica nodded, shoving food into her mouth. Food at work paled extremely in comparison. She barely heard any of what Krystal had to say about Law School and thesis projects as she ate. Her manners failed her as she chewed sloppily. Krystal handed her a napkin.
“You look tired.”
Jessica sighed, placing the napkin aside. “My patient is dying so I’ve been on duty round clock.”
“Isn’t that the opposite of what you’re supposed to do?”
“It happens,” as Seohyun reminded her. As machine charts reminded her everyday. “Her body’s too weak to keep up with the extractions. If we’re lucky, she’ll pass quickly and silently.”
“That does sound bleak.” Krystal deadpanned.
“And courthouses don’t?”
“I’m helping people get their justice.”
“And I’m helping people sleep happily at night.”
Krystal laughed, letting their conversation fall silent there. Jessica’s mind shifted away from the restaurant back to Sooyoung’s room. She really could think of nothing else, and ever since she had woken to Tiffany hovering over Sooyoung’s bed, Jessica couldn’t push those glossy eyes and wide smiles from her mind either.
It brought up tiny questions in the back of Jessica’s mind. Ones like the kind she had when she was a little kid, sitting on her dad’s lap and asking him about dreams. What was so great about them?
“Krystal?”
“Hmm?” She slurped, getting a drop on her chin. Jessica smirked, handing over a napkin.
“Have you ever gotten a dream?”
She shook her head, brow tugging in as she cleaned her mouth. “No.”
Jessica sat back, her mind now lost in thought. “Me neither.”
-/-/-/-
Jessica’s eyes fluttered where she stood, staring into Sooyoung’s room.
It was empty.
“Come to my office, please.” Seohyun spoke distinctly and softly behind her.
Jessica tore her eyes from the sterile space and followed Seohyun’s steps down the hall and into her office where sat down in a chair across from Seohyun.
“This is how things work around here. You know that.”
“I do.”
“Good.” Seohyun placed a large file envelope onto the desk. Jessica didn’t have to be told that it was meant for her to take and open. “We would never move anyone of rookie status to this level of jurisdiction so suddenly, but personal lives can interfere and we’re understaffed up here as it is.”
Opening the folder, she blinked at the name: Tiffany Hwang.
Jessica looked up. “Doesn’t she have a Caretaker?”
“Seunghyun will no longer be working at this facility,” Seohyun explained, cryptically. “You’ll train aside him for the days leading up to his leave. I’ve assured everyone in the SCS that you’re suited for the job.”
“If you believe so, doctor.” Jessica felt a nervous lump drop into her stomach.
Seohyun smirked. “I do.”
Jessica bowed before leaving the office with the file tucked securely at her side. She was headed for the elevators when a scream clawed at her ears just as she rounded a corner and her stomach dropped.
Following the shouts, Jessica found herself walking up the familiar hallway to where Sooyoung’s empty room was. In front of it she found Tiffany, arms and legs flailing against doctors fighting to restrain her.
“Sooyoung!” She screamed, tears leaking down her face. “Sooyoung! No!”
Seunghyun appeared in a flash, syringe in hand. Tiffany saw it and started struggling more, yelling for mercy as he closed in.
“Hold her!” He demanded.
Tiffany let out a cry as she was forced up against a wall and pinned there. Seunghyun worked swiftly, fighting passed Tiffany’s struggles to stab the needle into the side of her neck.
In a matter of seconds, she went limp with the sedation. The doctors picked her up in their arms as if she weighed nothing and hauled her off down the hall.
Jessica watched them go, her throat tightening up and blood running cold as the echo of Tiffany’s scream replayed itself in her mind.
Part II
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Date: 2016-01-19 06:25 pm (UTC)