A simple Case of Misdiagnosis
The raybot moved around him and flashed repeatedly.
“Done,” said the cold voice and Mr Zee exited the room.
“You say you’ve been in some pain and thought you’d broken a bone?”
“That’s correct, Doctor.”
“Mmmm. Curious. You have no bones, Mr Zee.”
“Everybody has bones.”
The doctor turned the screen round. “See for yourself.”
The screen showed a classic robotic framework.
Mr Zee looked at it incredulously. “There must be some mistake, surely.”
“The raybot scanner is our very latest diagnostic tool, Mr Zee. It can detect problems at the microcellular level. Only you don’t seem to have any cellular level.”
“But grew up just like any normal kid on the block.”
“You may contain memories of growing up as a normal boy but this machine tells us very conclusively that you are an android, Mr Zee. As far as I can tell you’ve never done any ‘growing’ since your initial activation.”
Zee looked shattered. “But...”
“You really didn’t know?”
Zee put his head in his hands.
“We can get you some counselling and proper maintenance for your systems.”
Zee remained silent.
“I’ll write you a referral to the A I Department, shall I? They’re very good and they may have a copy of your records. Have you sorted in no time. They can probably deal with the imaginary pain too.”
Imaginary pain? Zee sat motionless, trying to take it in. Up until that day, he’d never felt any pain at all. Perhaps...
“Well, I can’t really do much more -- under the circumstances.”
“Yes Doctor. I understand. Thank you for your time.”
“I’ll be in contact about...” began the Doctor but Mr Zee had already left.
The Doctor recognised Zee’s face in the headlines the next morning.
“Threw himself from a bridge railway apparently,” said the Doctor. “But it doesn’t make sense. It says here he broke every bone in his body.”
@ Oonah V Joslin 2020
