Chapter 2: The Same Symptoms
The hallway smelled different this time.
Katie noticed it the moment the receptionist buzzed her through the heavy door—the one that had swallowed Dr. Holloway and Laya two days ago. The waiting room had been the same: the wasp-hum of fluorescent lights, the looped PSA showing soundless students laughing, the faint drip from the ceiling vent. But back here, past the threshold, the air was heavier. Antiseptic layered over something older, metallic and sharp. The tang of sterilized instruments. The ghost of old blood.
Her sneakers squeaked against the linoleum as she followed the receptionist's pointed finger down a narrow corridor. Doors lined both sides, most closed, a few cracked open to reveal dark exam rooms. The overhead lights buzzed in a different key back here—lower, more insistent. A heartbeat counting down.
The receptionist stopped at the last door on the left. Room 7. She knocked twice, quick and sharp, then stepped aside without meeting Katie's eyes.
"Come in."
Dr. Holloway's voice, low and clinical. Katie pushed the door open.
The exam room was smaller than she'd expected. Sterile and bright, the walls lined with faded posters—healthy pink lungs, a perfect row of white teeth, a smiling family jogging through a park. The overhead fluorescent cast everything in a flat, unforgiving glow. An examination table dominated the center of the room, its paper sheet already pulled out, crinkling faintly as if someone had just shifted their weight on it.
Dr. Holloway stood by a counter, her back to Katie, arranging something metallic on a tray. The clink of steel on steel. Her silver-streaked bun was immaculate, not a single strand out of place. When she turned, her wire-rimmed glasses caught the light, obscuring her eyes for a moment. Morales." She gestured to the exam table. "Have a seat."
Katie's feet didn't move. Her throat felt tight, coated in the same metallic air. "You said on the phone it would just be a consult. Blood work, maybe."
"And it will be." Dr. Holloway's smile was thin, precise. "But I prefer to conduct my initial assessments in a controlled environment. Please. Sit."
The command wasn't loud. It didn't need to be.
Katie sat. The paper crinkled under her jeans, the sound too loud in the small room. She could hear her own breathing, shallow and quick. The wall behind the exam table had a clock—analog, old-fashioned—and its second hand ticked with a mechanical click that seemed to drill into her skull.
Dr. Holloway pulled a rolling stool from under the counter and sat down across from her, close enough that their knees almost touched. She folded her hands in her lap, the picture of patience. Behind her glasses, her eyes were the color of slate—flat, assessing, unreadable.
"Tell me about your symptoms."
Katie swallowed. She'd rehearsed this in her dorm room, staring at Laya's empty bed, the sheets still rumpled from two nights ago. "Fatigue. Mostly. And this—pressure, I guess. In my abdomen. It comes and goes."
"Any nausea? Chills?"
"Some. In the mornings."
Dr. Holloway nodded slowly, as if cataloging each word. "And when did you first notice these symptoms?"
"A few days ago. They've been getting worse."
"Interesting." The doctor's voice dropped, almost a murmur. "That aligns with Laya's timeline almost exactly."
Katie's heart skipped. She bit her lower lip, the familiar copper taste flooding her mouth. "Is she—do you know what's wrong with her?"
Dr. Holloway stood, the stool rolling back with a soft squeak. She moved to the counter, her back to Katie again, and began arranging instruments. Katie heard each one: the clink of a speculum, the rattle of a metal tray, the snap of latex gloves being pulled from a box.
"That's not something I can discuss," Dr. Holloway said. "Patient confidentiality. You understand."
"Of course." Katie's voice came out smaller than she intended. She watched the doctor's hands move across the counter, efficient and deliberate. A syringe. A vial. A length of tubing coiled like a pale snake.
Dr. Holloway turned. Her expression had shifted—softer now, almost maternal. But her eyes held something else. Something Katie couldn't name.
"I'd like to run a full diagnostic panel," she said. "Given the similarities to Laya's case, I think it's prudent to be thorough. But I'll need your cooperation."
"What kind of diagnostic panel?"
"Standard protocol." Dr. Holloway stepped closer, the syringe glinting in her hand. "First, I need you to remove all your clothing. Everything. Then lie face down on the table."
The words landed like stones in still water. Katie's skin prickled, her arms breaking out in gooseflesh despite the room's warmth.
"Face down?" she repeated. "Why?"
"The procedure requires access to your lumbar region and lower abdomen. It's more comfortable this way." Dr. Holloway's tone didn't change. Clinical. Steady. "I assure you, Ms. Morales, this is all routine. Laya went through the same protocol."
The mention of Laya's name hit Katie like a slap. She saw it again: Laya shuffling into the hallway, the tube trailing between her legs, her face a mask of shame. The sound of water rushing through pipes. The choked groan.
Katie's fingers found the hem of her shirt. She didn't move.
"I don't understand," she said. "What are you looking for?"
Dr. Holloway set the syringe down on the tray with a precise click. She pulled a pair of latex gloves from her pocket and began to put them on, the snap of rubber against her wrists loud in the quiet.
"Sometimes," she said, "the body holds onto things it shouldn't. Toxins. Waste. Emotional residue. It accumulates in the tissues, the organs, the spaces between. Over time, it manifests as fatigue, pain, a general sense of wrongness. My job is to find it. And remove it."
Katie's mouth went dry. "Remove it how?"
Dr. Holloway smiled. It didn't reach her eyes.
"One step at a time. Now—clothes off. Please."
The please was an afterthought. A formality.
Katie stood. Her legs felt foreign, disconnected from her body. She pulled her shirt over her head, the fabric catching on her ponytail, and dropped it on the chair. Her jeans followed, then her underwear, until she stood in the center of the room, exposed and shivering.
Dr. Holloway watched without expression. "On the table. Face down."
The paper crinkled as Katie climbed onto the exam table, her bare skin sticking to the cold vinyl beneath. She turned her face to the side, her cheek pressing into the paper, and stared at the wall. The clock ticked. The lights hummed. Somewhere down the hall, a door opened and closed.
Then she heard it: the soft, deliberate footsteps of Dr. Holloway approaching. And another sound, lower, metallic. A drawer sliding open. Something heavy being lifted.
Katie's breath caught. She tried to turn her head, but a firm hand pressed between her shoulder blades, pinning her down.
"Stay still," Dr. Holloway murmured. "This will only take a moment."
The first restraint closed around Katie's right wrist. Cold metal, padded on the inside but still unyielding. A click, sharp and final, as the lock engaged. Katie jerked, her body convulsing against the table, but the doctor's hand held her firm.
"What are you—"
"Shh." Another click. Her left wrist, secured to the table's metal frame. "Deep breaths."
"No—wait—"
The restraints on her ankles came next. Two more clicks, two more locks, and Katie was pinned, spread-eagle, face down on the crinkling paper. Her heart hammered against her ribs, a wild animal throwing itself against a cage. She could feel sweat beading at her hairline, trickling down her temples.
"Dr. Holloway, please—what is this? You said—you said this was routine—"
"It is." The doctor's voice came from somewhere behind her now, near the counter. The clink of instruments. The snap of gloves. "For patients who require the full protocol. Laya required it. And now, so do you."
Katie's vision blurred. The poster of the smiling family swam before her eyes. She tasted copper, realized she'd bitten through her lip. The clock ticked. The lights hummed. And somewhere, deep in the building, a pipe groaned with the rush of water.
"Just relax," Dr. Holloway said, her footsteps approaching again. "This is for your own good."
The last thing Katie heard before the room went silent was the soft, wet sound of something being unwrapped from sterile plastic.
The plastic made a sound like a whisper torn in half.
It crinkled, then smoothed, then crinkled again as Dr. Holloway's gloved fingers worked it free from its sterile sheath. Katie heard the object settle onto the metal tray with a soft, hollow click—lighter than the speculum, longer than the syringe. Something cylindrical. Something with a handle.
Her wrists strained against the restraints. The padded metal bit into her skin, not hard enough to bruise, but firm enough to remind her that escape was not an option. She turned her face against the paper sheet, her breath fogging the waxy surface, and tried to see behind her.
Dr. Holloway's shadow stretched across the wall, impossibly tall in the fluorescent glare.
"This instrument," the doctor said, her voice pitched low and even, "is called a proctoscope. It allows direct visualization of the rectum and the distal sigmoid colon. It's the first step in what we call a comprehensive tissue assessment."
Katie's stomach lurched. The words landed one by one, clinical and precise, each syllable a tiny hammer against her ribs. She knew what a proctoscope was—she'd read about them in health class, seen diagrams in anatomy textbooks. But those were abstractions, clinical illustrations on glossy pages. This was real. This was metal. This was happening to her.
"You're going to—" Her voice cracked. She swallowed hard and tried again. "You're going to put that inside me?"
"Standard protocol." The doctor's footsteps approached the table. "Laya tolerated it well. You will too."
There it was again—Laya's name, dropped like a stone into the silence. Katie's jaw clenched. She remembered the tube trailing between Laya's legs, the way her roommate had curled inward like a dying leaf. Whatever Laya had endured in this room, she had walked out hollowed. Katie had seen it. Katie had promised not to ask.
But Laya hadn't been strapped down. Laya hadn't been pinned like an insect on display.
"This isn't—you can't just—" Katie jerked her hips, trying to twist her body off the table. The restraints held. The paper sheet tore beneath her stomach with a sharp rip. "Let me go. Let me go right now."
Dr. Holloway's hand pressed flat against Katie's lower back, fingers spread wide, and pushed her down. The pressure was immense, bone-deep. Katie gasped, her spine flattening against the vinyl.
"I said stay still."
The doctor's voice had lost its clinical softness. It was flat now. Hard. The voice of someone who had done this many times before and had no patience for resistance.
Katie's heart hammered so hard she could feel it in her throat, her temples, the soles of her restrained feet. She yanked at the wrist restraints again, twisting her hands, trying to find give in the locking mechanism. There was none. The metal was cold and absolute.
"Please." The word came out wet, pathetic. She hated it. "Please, I don't—I didn't consent to this. You said routine. You said—"
"I said this was for your own good."
A new sound cut through the room: the sharp, metallic ratchet of something being tightened. Katie felt it before she understood it—a strap being cinched across her lower back, just above her hips, pulling her flat against the table. Then another across her upper back, just below her shoulder blades. The leather creaked as Dr. Holloway pulled each one taut.
Katie couldn't move. Not her arms, not her legs, not her torso. She could turn her head, just barely, and breathe in shallow sips. The paper sheet crinkled beneath her cheek with every exhale.
"Breathe through your nose," Dr. Holloway said. "This will be uncomfortable, but it shouldn't be painful. Not if you relax."
A drawer opened. A bottle clicked. The wet, slippery sound of lubricant being squeezed onto a gloved palm.
Katie squeezed her eyes shut. She heard everything: the squelch of the gel being spread, the doctor's steady breathing, the tick of the clock on the wall, the distant hum of the waiting room television through the walls. Her own pulse roared in her ears, a drumbeat of panic.
"First," Dr. Holloway said, "I'm going to lubricate the rectum. This will reduce friction and make the insertion easier."
Katie's mouth opened, but no sound came out. She felt the paper sheet being peeled back from her lower body, exposing her from the small of her back to her thighs. The air in the room was cool against her bare skin, raising goosebumps across her entire body.
Then, a gloved finger pressed against her.
Katie flinched, her whole body convulsing against the restraints. The straps bit into her back, holding her down. She heard herself make a sound—a choked, animal noise—and clamped her teeth shut around it.
"Relax," Dr. Holloway murmured. "Tensing will only make this worse."
The finger pushed inside. Slow, deliberate, coated in slick gel. Katie's breath left her in a rush. The sensation was alien, invasive, a pressure that radiated up through her pelvis and into her gut. She felt every knuckle, every ridge of the latex glove.
Then a second finger joined the first.
Katie writhed, or tried to. The straps held her flat. Her hands curled into fists, nails digging into her palms. The clock ticked. The lights hummed. Her pulse was a wild thing, thrashing in her chest.
"A third," Dr. Holloway said, almost to herself. "You're tighter than Laya. She was more—accommodating."
The words landed like acid. Katie's eyes flew open, staring at the faded poster on the wall—the smiling family, the perfect teeth, the whole bright lie of health and happiness. Her vision blurred. She felt the third finger slide in alongside the others, stretching her, filling her, and she bit down on her lip until she tasted blood.
"That's it," Dr. Holloway whispered. "Good girl. Now—let's see what we're working with."
The fingers withdrew, slow and deliberate, leaving Katie empty and aching and raw. She heard the doctor pick up the proctoscope from the tray, heard the soft click of the light being switched on. A cold, focused beam of illumination played across her exposed skin.
Katie pressed her forehead into the ruined paper sheet and waited.
The proctoscope touched her, blunt and unyielding, and began to push.
The pressure was immediate and absolute.
Katie's breath tore out of her in a ragged gasp, her fingers splaying wide against the vinyl as the blunt tip pressed past the first ring of muscle. The stretch burned—a deep, pulling heat that radiated up through her pelvis and settled like lead in her lower back. She heard the paper sheet crinkle beneath her cheek, felt the leather straps creak as her body tried instinctively to arch away.
"Breathe," Dr. Holloway said. "Through your nose. Slow."
Katie couldn't breathe. Her throat had closed. Her lungs had forgotten their function. The proctoscope pushed deeper, millimeter by millimeter, and she felt every single one—the cold metal sliding against tender tissue, the lubricant squelching with each forward motion, the hollow tube pressing against something deep inside her that radiated pain in waves.
"Good," the doctor murmured. "First sphincter cleared. You're doing well."
The words meant nothing. Katie's mind had fractured into fragments—the clock's mechanical tick, the hum of the fluorescent tubes, the distant sound of a cough from the waiting room. She clung to those sounds like driftwood in a flood, trying to anchor herself to something that wasn't the invasion happening below her waist.
The proctoscope advanced again.
Katie whimpered. The sound escaped before she could swallow it, high and thin and humiliating. She bit down on her lip, hard enough to feel the skin split, and tasted copper flooding her mouth.
"Second sphincter," Dr. Holloway announced, her voice carrying a note of clinical satisfaction. "This is where most patients struggle. You're holding remarkably still."
The scope twisted. A slow, deliberate rotation that sent sparks of white pain flashing behind Katie's eyes. She felt the tip of the instrument trace a circle inside her, mapping the walls of her rectum, and she understood with sickening clarity that Dr. Holloway was looking for something. Searching. Cataloging.
"What—" Katie's voice broke. She tried again, her words slurred with pain. "What are you looking for?"
"Tissue abnormalities. Polyps. Signs of chronic inflammation." The scope pushed deeper, and Katie's vision went gray at the edges. "Laya had significant inflammation in the sigmoid region. I suspect you do as well."
The name hit her like a second invasion. Laya. Laya had lain here, strapped down, while this same instrument carved its way through her insides. Laya had felt this same burning stretch, this same helpless immobility. The memory of her roommate's hollowed eyes, her whispered plea—don't ask—suddenly made a terrible, crystalline sense.
"How deep—" Katie gasped, her body trembling against the restraints. "How deep does it go?"
"As deep as necessary." Dr. Holloway's gloved hand pressed flat against Katie's lower back, steadying her. "The sigmoid colon curves at approximately forty centimeters. We're at fifteen now. I need to reach the descending colon to complete the assessment."
Fifteen centimeters. The number meant nothing and everything. Katie tried to do the math—how many more of these agonizing millimeters until she reached some arbitrary limit—but her brain had turned to static. She pressed her forehead into the paper sheet and felt tears leak from the corners of her eyes, hot and silent.
The scope advanced again.
This time, Katie couldn't contain the cry. It burst out of her—a raw, animal sound that echoed off the sterile walls. The restraints bit into her wrists and ankles as she thrashed, her body acting on instinct alone, trying to escape what could not be escaped.
"Stop," she sobbed. "Please, please stop, I can't—"
"You can." Dr. Holloway's voice was implacable. "And you will. Laya did."
The scope reached twenty centimeters. Twenty-five. The pressure had transformed into something else—a deep, cramping ache that radiated through Katie's entire abdomen. She felt the tube curve inside her, following the natural bend of her intestines, and the sensation was so profoundly wrong that her mind recoiled from it.
She heard everything with terrible clarity: the wet slide of lubricated metal, the soft squelch of tissue yielding, the steady rhythm of Dr. Holloway's breathing. The doctor's shadow moved across the wall as she adjusted her grip on the instrument, and Katie watched it through blurred vision, hating it, hating all of it.
"Thirty centimeters," Dr. Holloway said. "And there—"
The scope stopped.
Katie felt the tip press against something—a resistance, a place where the tissue felt different. She heard Dr. Holloway exhale, a soft sound of discovery.
"Interesting."
"What?" Katie's voice was barely a whisper. "What is it?"
"Localized inflammation. The tissue here is friable—it bleeds easily. There's also a distinct narrowing of the lumen." The scope twisted slightly, and Katie gasped. "This is exactly what I found in Laya. A focal point of toxic accumulation."
Katie's stomach heaved. She felt bile rise in her throat and swallowed it back, the acid burning her esophagus. Toxic accumulation. The phrase conjured images of rot and decay, of something festering inside her, feeding on her from within.
"I need to take a sample," Dr. Holloway said. "For biopsy."
The words registered somewhere in the back of Katie's fracturing mind. Biopsy. They were going to cut pieces out of her. They were going to reach inside her with tiny metal jaws and tear away fragments of her flesh.
She heard the click of an attachment being fitted to the proctoscope—a new instrument, smaller, with a spring-loaded mechanism that snapped open and closed. The sound was like a trap being set.
"This will pinch," Dr. Holloway warned. "Try not to move."
Katie squeezed her eyes shut. She felt the biopsy forceps slide through the hollow channel of the proctoscope, felt them brush against the inflamed tissue deep inside her. Then a sharp, bright pain—a bite taken out of her from the inside—and she screamed.
The sound tore through the room, raw and ragged. The restraints held her flat as her body convulsed, her hips jerking uselessly against the straps. She heard the forceps withdraw, heard something small drop into a specimen jar with a wet, final plink.
"Sample obtained," Dr. Holloway said. "One more."
The forceps advanced again. Katie sobbed into the paper sheet, her tears soaking through to the vinyl beneath. She had stopped resisting. Her body had gone limp, a puppet with its strings cut, and she lay there and let it happen because there was no other choice.
The second bite came. She barely felt it now—just a distant pressure, a tugging sensation somewhere deep inside. Her mind had retreated to a small, quiet place where pain couldn't reach. The clock ticked. The lights hummed. Somewhere far away, a door opened and closed.
Then the proctoscope was withdrawing, a slow, careful retreat that reversed each agonizing advance. Katie felt the tip pull free of her body with a soft, wet sound, and the emptiness that followed was almost worse—a strange, echoing absence where violation had been.
"Is it—" She could barely form words. "Are you done?"
"With the examination, yes." Dr. Holloway's footsteps moved to the counter. The clink of the proctoscope being deposited on the tray. The snap of latex gloves being removed. "Your tissue sample confirms what I suspected. You have the same condition as Laya. The same toxic accumulation. The same urgent need for treatment."
Katie's breath hitched. "Treatment?"
"Yes." Dr. Holloway's voice came from behind her now, near the cupboards. A cabinet door opened. Glass jars clinked together. "The same treatment I administered to Laya. It's the only way to purge the accumulated toxins from your system."
Katie heard the doctor set something on the counter—two jars, by the sound of it, their glass bases clicking against the metal surface. Then the squeak of a cart being rolled across the floor, closer and closer to the exam table where Katie lay helpless and exposed.
The straps across her back loosened. Katie gasped as her spine could finally expand, but she didn't try to rise. She couldn't. Her arms and legs were still pinned, her muscles had turned to water.
Dr. Holloway came into view, carrying a small cart. On it sat two jars—one filled with a thick, pale liquid that could only be milk, the other with a dark, viscous substance that dripped slowly down the glass. Molasses. Beside the jars were a large metal bowl, a length of flexible tubing, and a funnel.
"This is the treatment," Dr. Holloway said. She picked up the milk and unscrewed the lid, the smell of dairy filling the small room. "First, we prepare the solution."
She poured the milk into the bowl—a long, steady stream that splashed against the metal. Then the molasses followed, thick and sluggish, glugging from the jar in dark, heavy dollops. The mixture swirled together, pale and brown and terrible.
Katie watched through the narrow slit of her vision. Her body was still trembling, her muscles spasming with aftershocks of pain. The milk and molasses. Laya had received this. Laya had felt this same mixture inside her.
Dr. Holloway picked up a wooden spoon and began to stir.