A Patient Woman

[Jakob Benson]

[member="Amilthi Camlenn"]

The Iniquitous Sanitorium was already starting to see a trickle of patients arriving. Each had their own conflictions and degree of mental instability. A few had arrived on their own accord, wishing to seek the help that Benson could provide. While others were brought in either by hunters or by family members.

One such arrival brought in by a hunter was Amilthi. Her processing went by smoothly. She was checked for weapons, then had a blood sample taken, afterwhich she was registered into the system. Following that she was escorted by a unit of 501-Z Police droids to the asteroid that contained the asylum part of the facility. After a winding and dizzying route full of lifts going up, down and through multiple corridors meant to confuse, she was brought to the interview room where the Doctor was waiting.

Benson sat at his desk with a paper file open upon it. Another chair was across from him, clearly for the young woman to sit on. As she entered he pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose. "Glad you could join us. Have a seat. I'm going to ask you a series of questions and I'd like you to answer them honestly, no matter how silly they may seem. Understood?" Benson brought out a pen from his breat pocket and touched it to the paper as he prepared to write. Of course he was waiting for her compliance.

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

Amilthi did not exactly know where she was or why she was there. Her memory of the past days was very spotty, and she recognised that this should alarm her, but it failed to. Even now, reality seemed to flicker in and out of existence frequently, and sometimes continued in a different place from where it had left off. She noted this fact unfazed. The situation was most unusual, but all she could feel was a vague amusement at it, of which merely a drop was mixed into a deep sea of tranquility. It all seemed so insignificant, ephemeral, and it could not touch her. Because there wasn't really any her to touch.

She crossed her legs under her skirt as she sat down at the table, dressed in the simple, coarse clothes she had been found in, which would befit the poorest on any backwater Outer Rim world. She looked at the man in front of her with her head tilted, examining him with her cool, steel-blue eyes. "I'm sure they will be very silly indeed", she said with perfect sincerity.

[member="Jakob Benson"]​

 

[Jakob Benson]

There was next to nothing that Benson knew about [member="Amilthi Camlenn"] , only that she wss claimed by the hunter that brought her there to be mentally unstable, and a believer in the Force. What her upbringing was like, where she was from, all of that was unknown.

One look at her and one could tell that she wasn't all there. But that's what this first little meeting was about. To learn more about her and better understand how best to help her.

"True or false; I like mechanical engineering."

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

[member="Jakob Benson"]​

Amilthi looked at the man in silence for several seconds. Her eyes were oddly expressionless, and yet she was clearly perfectly awake and did not seem to be confused or have failed to comprehend the words.

For a moment, she considered reading the man's mind and answering the question he had literally asked, if just to mess with him. But then the result was so predictable that the experiment was unnecessary and not worth performing.

Eventually, she smiled faintly. "I take it you are asking about me, not about yourself, though I'm sure I can help you if you are seeking to understand your own being."

She folded her hands in her lap and straightened the position of her head. Her back was, as before, scrupulously, almost unnaturally upright.

"Like and dislike - very dubious notions. It is necessary, useful, has beneficial effects. But you probably mean: does it cause pleasant sensations to arise which carry the danger of attracting attachment or craving? No. Is this creature that I am, under common circumstances, disposed to seek out opportunities to engage in the activity? No."

 

[Jakob Benson]

Benson held the pen over the paper as [member="Amilthi Camlenn"] stayed silent, apparently thinking about her answer. He watched her behaviour which lacked some of the bold egos that he had been witnessing from others as of late. That in and of itself was refreshing.

And as she spoke, Benson began jotting down a few notes after circling 'False' on the paper. There appeared to be a bit of separation between herself and her body. The how's and why's of that were surely going to be discovered. For now he was just assessing her.

"True or False; I like cooking."

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

Amilthi chuckled at the question. "Cooking is awful. One can't meditate while one does it, that interferes with timing, and timed wrongly, all sorts of reactions will run too far or not far enough and the results are unpalatable."

Upon mention of the topic, awareness arose of the fact that she was a little peckish. Amilthi did, and said, nothing. It was just one of many irrelevant sensations that were alternating in her consciousness, like the coarseness of the cloth or the slight chill she was feeling, none of which demanded a reaction.

[member="Jakob Benson"]​

 

[Jakob Benson]

Benson's expression never changed while [member="Amilthi Camlenn"] answered his question. It wasn't uncommon for someone not to like cooking. Though her reason for not liking it was unusual.

If Benson was the social type, he'd of made his own comment on the question that he had posed, yet instead he just moved onto the next one.

"True or false; I have a good relationship with my parents."

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

"Neither true nor false, like many questions sentients tend to be very attached to. You are presupposing that one has any kind of relationship with one's parents at all. But isn't that rather myopic? I am certain your imagination doesn't yet cover all the strange things in this galaxy, but surely this is one of the least outlandish among the unusual ones." Amilthi looked at the man with a quizzical smile.

[member="Jakob Benson"]​

 

[Jakob Benson]

"You'll find my questions to be...all over the map, or so the saying goes." Once again Benson jotted down her answer and moved onto the next. "True or false; my bowel movements are quite regular."

[member="Amilthi Camlenn"] was quite an interesting case. She lacked the narcissism that he was used to dealing with. It was no wonder that she was non-resistant when she was brought in.

Of course there'll be further study on her after this initial appointment. And already he was eager for it. But there were other things to do first. Benson just needed to be patient.

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

"When I eat, yes." Amilthi's answer was so simple, and yet again managed to be quite strange.

The mention of internal organs nudged Amilthi's awareness in their direction. Unlike most people, she could readily feel into her body, feel the shape and movement of her organs. She could feel her heart beating not through its effects on her arteries or her chest, but directly. She could feel her lungs expanding and contracting, could feel her stomach work - except not at the moment because it was very empty -, and could follow with her attention the long coils of her intestines. It was, on some level, disgusting, but this very fact helped tremendously with relieving the mind of unhealthy attachment to the body, its functions, and its desires and urges, an objective she found sorely underappreciated among the Jedi of this day and age.

[member="Jakob Benson"]​

 

[Jakob Benson]

Just a small answer was given by [member="Amilthi Camlenn"] this tine, and one that Benson appreciated. That was generally how he preferred this first session to go, but every patient was different. In time they'd learn.

He jotted down her answer and asked another question. "True or False; I like to hear the sound of others screaming." This was a question who's answer tended to tell a lot about a person.

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

"What an awful question to ask!" Nevertheless, Amilthi seemed more amused than appalled. "Of course not."

Her gaze wandered around, and it occurred to Amilthi to wonder where she was. It was not the sudden awakening of a burning need to know, and far from causing disorientation and panic; rather, it was the idle and unengaged sort of wondering. No answer suggested itself, except that she had, for whatever reason, a hunch that they might be in space. She noted this situation and accepted it.

[member="Jakob Benson"]​

 

[Jakob Benson]

Benson didn't seem to react as [member="Amilthi Camlenn"] answered his question. He merely jotted down her answer. There was no right or wrong answer in this examination. It was all for study.

"True or false; I like to smell flowers." Another important question sandwiched among the others. Already he could see that the patient was distracted. Yet by what was still to be determined.

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

"Neither true nor false. If I said yes, you would hear that I am attracted to flowers. If I said no, you would think I experience aversion towards them. Neither is the case. Your question implies too narrow a view of the possibilities."

Her voice sounded kind and understanding, but it was difficult not to hear her words as at least a little patronising.

[member="Jakob Benson"]​

 

[Jakob Benson]

Benson almost raised a brow at [member="Amilthi Camlenn"] 's reply. Almost. Her assumption as to what her answer to that question would determine were wrong. "On the contrary, this question has more to deal with one's relevance with time than anything else." But he jotted her response down anyways.

"True or false; I fear my own mortality."

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

Amilthi idly wondered whether all these trivial questions which described such a pedestrian view of life - not for a moment did she entertain his excuse that flowers were supposed to have anything to do with time or a being's perception of it - were actually being asked with any intent to learn something, or whether the man opposite to her was merely trying to see how she would react and whether she would ever interrupt his sequence. She noticed that she was wondering, that her mind was looking for something to process. But instead of poking the man and interacting with him, she decided to ignore him.

The Jedi closed her eyes. It was as if the flick of a switch in her mind put her in a different world. All her sensory experiences faded away, the sensations of her own body faded away, and a feeling of expansiveness arose. She became aware, in an indescribable, non-visual way, of her surroundings in a vast radius, of the facility, the asteroid, and the many disturbed and unhappy people on it. This direct awareness was something entirely new. In the past, the idea of being on an asteroid might, in such a situation, perhaps have occurred to her, but she would have had to be pick it up and believe it. It had been nothing like the unmediated experiential knowledge she could now acquire through what was somehow a new sense door of the mind.

Her body, a stony expression on her face, eyes closed, remained completely immobile.

Jakob Benson

 

[Jakob Benson]

Amilthi Camlenn

Benson watched as she shut herself down in a smiliar way that a baby animal would. The closing of her eyes was the easiest way to make him disappear. And that was her response.

He jotted this response down in his notes and then closed the file, slipping it into the drawer of his desk. After another moment of studying the patient in silence, he got to his feet and walked around his desk. "I think we're done here for today." That was said mostly for himself than anything else. Whereas most of his patients were violent, in denial and unruly, she was more....delicate. And intriguing.

Benson pulled out a commlink from his pocket and clicked the button. "The patient is ready for her room. Take her to C-23." It wasn't a cell designed for Force users as he wasn't yet aware of her Force sensitivity. But it was certainly secure.

The droids came in on cue and got her to her feet, holding firmly on her arms. If she didn't choose to walk she was dragged to her room which was secured by an energy shield, set to deploy once the droids had placed her inside on the bed.

Benson on the other hand went to his living quarters. Tomorrow he may see her again.

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

Amilthi touched the force field with her hand, more out of idle interest than to really test it. She watched her own hand with seeming fascinating as she withdrew it, observing the tingling sensation in it. Then she went back to the bed and sat down on it in a cross-legged seat, paying no mind to the questionable propriety of doing so while wearing a skirt. She put her hands, one cupped inside the other, in her lap and closed her eyes.

Hours that felt like days later, Amilthi opened her eyes again and found herself in complete darkness. She had seen so many place, so many people - all of them real, in one place or another, often she didn't even know where. She had almost been them. Now it was a relief to have returned to her narrow confines, to be faced with nothing but the simplicity of the feeling of her coarse clothes and the air on her skin and the pressure of the mattress under her legs and bottom. She dwelt on those sensations, aware of them, but not interacting, not reacting; giving rest to her body in its stable position, and giving rest to her mind, too, calmly abiding in the moment.

***​

She had not slept for a moment that night, she had not needed it, and did not need it now. She still sat there, her mind still, and empty but for the simple sensations of her physical being, when the force field was switched off again.

Jakob Benson