We Are Legion (We Are Bob)

I snapped back to consciousness. There was no transition, none of the normal vagueness you get when you wake up. I remembered the car coming at me, which I thought was odd. I would have expected the last few seconds to be lost as they didn’t have time to enter long-term memory. On the other hand, maybe the last few seconds had been lost.

I lay there, without moving or opening my eyes, and did careful inventory. I felt no pain. In fact, I couldn’t feel my arms, my legs, or my body at all. I was getting none of the normal proprioceptive cues that would tell me if I were lying down, comfortable, or anything. Not really a good sign—complete paralysis seemed a likely explanation.

I experienced a moment of panic, followed immediately by a kind of bemused surprise. The panic seemed to be purely intellectual. I had no sensation of elevated breathing, increased heart-rate, or fight-or-flight muscle tension. Nothing. While I was normally very analytical, this seemed especially Vulcan, even for me.

Wow. Am I paralyzed from the forehead down? Maybe I’m in an induced coma? If so, it’s not a very good one.

Gathering my resolve, I opened my eyes.

Or tried to. Nothing happened. This time, I did panic. Being blind was the stuff of nightmares for me. For a few moments, my thoughts spun out of control. I thought of movies I would never see, books I would never read.

But again, the panic didn’t self-reinforce. No adrenaline rush, no nothing. I couldn’t think of a medical condition that would do that. Maybe drugs. Good ones.

I was getting a little weirded out. Over and above the panic thing, I mean. I decided on drugs as a good working hypothesis.

Determined to get a handle on things, I tried again, really thought about opening my eyes. The mechanics, the feeling of my eyes opening…