The Traveler has no memory of before.
He finds himself in a hospital office. A childless playroom. With a helpful but strange doctor.
A doctor who specializes in grief.
But why is the Traveler here? And what has he run from?
A gritty science-fiction short story with a heart-wrenching conclusion.
“Identity” is available for the month of November 2026 on this site. The ebook is also available on most major online retail stores. You can also read this story in the collection Baverstock’s Allsorts Volume 2.
Identity
By Jessica Baverstock
The room was clean, fresh, smelling of daffodils in sunshine, its green carpet stretching underneath the oak desk like grass. The soft blue of the walls and white of the ceiling almost felt like the real world. Almost. There was no window in the room, nothing to remind you of what true sky and clouds looked like.
The Traveler stood in its center, contemplating whether he should sit in the white leather chair and lay his arms on the chrome armrests. Would they be cool to the touch? Would their coolness seep into him and relieve the flush of fever he felt about his neck and forehead?
His eyes traveled across the emptiness of the oak desk, not a paper or a computer pad in sight on the dark green felt top that reminded him of a billiard table. No pockets. Only two white hands resting, laid one on top of the other in a relaxed fashion. The lean arms lead to the clean white shoulders that disappeared into the sleeveless doctor’s coat of the woman in front of him.
The Traveler frowned. Doctors should always have sleeves, he felt. He knew not why, but he knew it to be important.
The doctor’s blond hair tumbled over her shoulders, tickling the sides of her stern face. Her lips were a soft pink, the color of the inside of bunny ears. Her eyes were a blue, a tint darker than the walls of her office.
“Please sit,” she said, lifting one of her long white hands and gesturing to the white chair.
The Traveler hesitated. He licked at his bottom lip, the faintest aftertaste of spaghetti sauce catching the interest of his tongue. He had no memory of eating, but clearly the evidence was still there.
The doctor stared at him, her hand still in mid-air. “Well?”
The Traveler wondered if this was the kind of place where he should obey doctors, do exactly as he was told, or whether this was a place to show defiance. Seeing as he had no memory of his life before this moment, he had no information to base his decision on—only the feeling of his stomach.
His stomach told him to sit.
The chair seemed to sigh beneath him as he lowered his weight into it, as if it were grateful he had finally made his decision. He pulled at the trousers of the silvery skintight suit he was wearing, adjusting it so it did not pinch at the top of his legs in his new position, its shimmering silver fibers changing from gray to gold as the fluorescent light from the ceiling caught the movement of his fingers. His feet seemed to ache even more now that his weight was not upon them.
The doctor lowered her hand back to the desk and leaned slightly forward, her pink lips parting as her eyes scanned him back and forth. “What is it you wish me to do for you?” Her voice flowed into him, like the strings of a melody. She spoke in a soft, gentle tone, coaxing the answer from him.
The Traveler glanced about the room, looking for some clue as to why he was here and what he wanted from his woman. To his left was an alcove, painted in the light pink and orange and blue of blackboard chalks. On the green, grassy carpet lay children’s toys—a fabric giraffe with lumpy stuffing, a yellow and red cement truck, a big wooden letter C painted purple.
“I want you to take away my sadness,” he said. He did not know why he said it. His stomach had told him to. Was he sad? Was that what caused the heaviness in his arms and legs? Was the throbbing in his temples and behind his eyes the sadness pounding inside his head, demanding to be let out?
“I see,” said the doctor. She nodded her head, the movement causing the round metal earrings dangling from her earlobes to tinkle like wind chimes. “Where does your sadness come from?”
The Traveler turned his attention back to her face. How was he to answer? He did not know. He waited for his stomach to respond, but there was nothing. Could he simply say he did not remember? Was this the kind of place where you could say that kind of thing and they would understand? Or was it the kind of place where they would strap you to a bed and believe they could do whatever they wished to you? For the moment he was still in control.
“Never mind,” said the doctor. “We understand it can be difficult to discuss sensitive subjects, especially so early in the process. Tell me,” she said, tapping her long white index finger meditatively on the green felt, “is this a recent sadness or one you have had for a long time?”
The Traveler considered this. “Recent,” he said. After all, he could not remember anything before this room, which was recent enough.
The doctor nodded. “Have you received any treatment like this before?”
“No,” The Traveler said quickly. Perhaps this would encourage her to give him further details of whatever it was they did in this strange, fake world of theirs.
“Very well,” she said, pushing back her chair as she stood. “Allow me to give you a tour of our facilities.” As she walked out from behind the desk she revealed the sleeveless coat she was wearing to be a dress, its thick white material ending just above her knees. She wore sheer beige stockings which made her legs look like they belonged to a painted mannequin, and her cute, baby pink dress shoes had a plastic sheen to them.
The Traveler stood and followed her as she crossed the room and turned the hooked metal handle of the sky-blue door.
The corridor beyond the door was dimly lit, the friendly colors of the doctor’s office replaced by the clinical off-white of the walls and the dull yellow of the linoleum floor which continued seamlessly up the first foot or so of the wall. The left wall was interrupted at regular intervals with glass and shallow windowsills, each mirrored pane reflecting the drab right wall which continued unbroken until it reached the nurses’ station just before the bend in the corridor.
The Traveler followed the doctor into the corridor, the chill of the air intensifying the feverishness of his face. The sting of antiseptic tickled at his nose hairs, threatening a sneeze. He lifted his calloused finger to his nose to prevent the outburst, and smelled the faintest whiff of tea tree oil on his hand. Had it come from a tree itself, or was it simply a hand sanitizer he had used when entering this facility? It reminded him once again that there was a wider world beyond these insipid walls. But did he wish to return to it?
The doctor cleared her throat. She was standing beside the first window and gestured for him to stand beside her.
He approached the window, expecting it would perhaps show the outside world—a night with bright stars like far off light bulbs, perhaps the moon with its pocked, melon shape. Instead he found himself face to face with his reflection. He started in surprise.
His brown hair was unkempt, his face unshaven with roughly four days’ worth of growth, and the bags beneath his eyes dragged at the edges of his eyelids. He ran his hand across his raspy cheeks. This was unacceptable. He did not know who he had been before the sky-blue room, but he knew it was not a man who would look this way by choice.
“Allow me to show you some of our treatment methods,” said the doctor, pressing a button beside the window that turned it mercifully transparent.
The room beyond was painted in the chalk-like colors of the alcove in the doctor’s office. On the walls was a mural of huge sunflowers and daisies, with rainbow butterflies and busy bees flitting from flower to flower. The images moved, a looping animation of a few seconds, the petals of the flowers fluttering slightly, the insects hovering as their wings seemed stuck in a permanent tremor.
In the center of the room, sitting on the chessboard pattern of the carpet, was a little girl—her blond hair tied up in pigtails, each ending in a ringlet. Beside her was a man. A doting man. A father. The Traveler could see it in his eyes. The father knelt next to his daughter, one hand resting on the ground behind her and the other placing wooden blocks on the red, green, and blue tower they were building. The father’s lips moved in the slow, loving drawl of a storyteller and the little girl gazed up at him from time to time with the childhood wonder that would all too quickly fade with the passage of time.
Treasure it, The Traveler wished to say. Savor every moment.
“As you can see,” said the doctor, snapping The Traveler back to the realization that he was not the father sitting next to the child in the room, “the patient here is fitted with a small device just behind his ear.”
The Traveler tore his gaze away from the interplay between the father and daughter and focused on the small, round, metallic device fixed to the father’s skull, poking out from the oily black threads of hair.
“Whenever the patient experiences sadness, a small neurological shock is administered to train the brain that such thoughts are unhelpful. Gradually the brain will avoid the thoughts and the sadness will be removed.”
The Traveler frowned. So many questions entered his mind.
“But what does this patient have to be sad about?” was the first of his questions, and he spoke it aloud.
“The child you see in this room is a clone of the daughter he lost in a tragic accident. Although the child has been replaced, the patient has been struggling with the sad memories that surface whenever he is around her. Obviously were such a situation allowed to continue, the whole family would suffer, so he came to us.”
The Traveler looked again at the little girl. So small. So perfect. So beautiful.
He asked his next question. “But how does a neurological shock remove the sadness?”
“In the same way that small electrical shocks train animals to remain within a confined area. No living being wishes to feel pain, so they train themselves to avoid it.”
The Traveler felt the pain within him, the sadness. It made no sense. Were what the doctor said true, then no one would ever feel negative emotions, and yet people did. Every day. He did.
But he did not know why. And then he wondered, was this because he too was avoiding the pain? Remaining penned up in the safety of forgetfulness so as to avoid the onslaught of what memory would bring?
“I do not think this treatment would be effective for me,” he said.
“No, not in your case,” said the doctor. “Come, we shall move on.” She pressed the button, and The Traveler’s reflection caught him once again, unawares.
He followed the clack, clack, clacking of the doctor’s shoes as she walked to the next window. He did not look up until the glass had turned transparent.
The patient, a woman with wavy, graying hair slicked back with sweat, sat in a recliner chair covered in a dark blue hospital blanket, her limbs strapped down by thick brown belts with silver buckles. She watched a screen with wild, bloodshot eyes, the wrinkles along her cheeks providing furrows for her tears.
“This is a new treatment we are trialling. The patient is exposed to the painful stimulus until they become inured to it. It forms a callus in the mind, as it were, a numbing so that the patient can return to some form of life without being haunted by their past. It has proved effective in some cases.”
“And in others?” said The Traveler, watching the horror in the woman’s eyes.
“All patients accept the treatment voluntarily. We would never do anything without a patient’s express permission.”
He heard the tightness in her voice and he did not like it. “Your methods seem drastic,” he said, stepping away from the window and averting his gaze as she moved to press the button to return it to its mirror state.
“We treat the patients no one else is able to treat,” she said, cupping her hands together and resting them just below her stomach.
It was a gesture he recognized.
“You’re pregnant,” he said, though he could not detect a bump beneath the thick white material of her dress.
“Yes.” She looked at him quizzically. “My third. How did you know?”
He looked at her long white hands, but thought instead of small, brown hands. He thought of a crooked right pinkie finger. A gold wedding ring, tarnished from seven years of wear. Chipped gold nail polish. She liked gold.
He corrected himself.
She had liked gold. Now she didn’t, but he couldn’t remember why.
“Are you okay?” said the doctor, leaning forward and touching his arm.
“Yes,” he said, surprised by his need to sniff. A strange drop of water ran down his cheek. He looked up at the rough white tiles of the ceiling and wondered if there was a leak.
“Come,” said the doctor. “Let me show you another treatment. One that may be more appropriate to your situation.”
The Traveler stepped back, raising his hands and returning his gaze to the long, narrow, dark corridor. “I do not wish to continue,” he said. He expected the words to come out of his mouth firmly, but instead they wavered and almost stuttered.
“You have no choice,” she said, the music of her words lowering with the determination and firmness he wished he had.
“Why?” he said. It was a question he should have asked before. In her office. It should have been his first question. In fact, it had been his first question. But not today. When it had happened. When it had first happened, that had been his first question. Why?
“Because you are our patient. It is our duty of care to treat you.” She stepped forward, her pink shoes clacking towards him.
“Your methods are barbaric,” he said. His breath was no longer deep, but shallow, as if he were a drowning man gasping each time his head broke the water. “In this century medicine should be different. It should be better. We should never, ever lose someone. Let alone two loved ones on the same day. You should be able to save them! Why didn’t you save them?” He collapsed onto the floor, in a puddle of the man he was. He felt like everything within him was sagging, leaching out of him and drifting aimlessly across the linoleum. There was no point stopping it, no point in pulling himself back together. There was nothing left in the real world, with the true blue sky, the puffy clouds, the bright stars, and the melon-shaped moon, nothing left to go back to.
Tears flowed, sliding down his cheeks and nose, then falling free from him.
“Sir,” said the doctor, on her knees beside him. She rested her long white hand on his shoulder, “tell me about it. Tell me what your sadness is.”
“Don’t you know?” he said, looking up at her, the movement redirecting his tears along his jaw.
“No,” she said. “You simply wandered into our reception area and asked to speak to a doctor. The nurses could find nothing physically wrong with you so they sent you to me. You look as if you have been wandering for some time. Days maybe? Where did you come from?”
The Traveler thought back, but all he could remember were hospital corridors. But not corridors like these. Wider. Brighter. Noisier. With alarms. And people shouting.
“My wife,” he said, surprised by the words but happy to let them flow. “And the baby.” Then the words stopped. They choked in his throat. One last word was left. It was stuck and he pushed it, desperately, wanting to know what it was. Wanting to hear the word he couldn’t say. He coughed it out. “Gone.”
He felt dizzy. The corridor swam as if it were about to crash over him and send him to his end. To remove his sadness forever.
***
“Mr. Peters?” The voice, the musical voice, was asking him a question.
He floated back to consciousness gradually, feeling lighter. The darkness around him and the fuzziness of his mind were comforting, like a blanket. He did not wish to wake from it.
“William?” The voice was asking again.
He felt annoyance at being disturbed. Couldn’t he stay here for a little longer?
“Can you open your eyes for me?” said the voice.
He sighed. “No,” he said, and smiled to himself. He snuggled back into the fuzziness.
“It’s good to see you’re looking happier,” said the voice.
His curiosity jabbed him. Was he happier? Did he have the right to be happier? The sadness rose from his stomach like bile and he grimaced. He remembered now. He remembered everything.
He opened his eyes, finding light, real sunlight streaming into the room through lace curtains. The bed he lay in was firm, with warm, white hospital blankets over him and metal rails on each side to prevent him from leaving it. A machine gently beeped beside him, and his left hand felt colder where a drip fed him fluids. From somewhere beyond the open door of his sparse room wafted the smell of bacon and warm bread.
Standing beside his bed, casting a soft shadow across him, was the doctor. Her hair was straighter and darker than he remembered it, and her lips were no longer pink but a cherry red. Her stiff, white coat now had long sleeves that stretched all the way to her hands.
“Do you feel a little better this morning?” she said. “You have been sleeping for several days.”
“Have I?” he said, digging his elbows into the scratchy sheet to sit up.
“Here, let me help you.” She pressed a button on a little remote clipped to the bed sheet beside his pillow and the bed began to rise to a sitting position. “Would you like some breakfast?”
The smell was enticing, but his stomach knotted in protest. “I don’t think I’m ready for that.”
The doctor nodded. “What do you feel ready for?” She looked at him kindly, asking with her eyes more than her words.
“I am ready to be William Peters again,” he said.
She cocked her head, her brow furrowing as if she were trying to understand him. Then she nodded. “I don’t think it’s an easy thing to be William Peters right now.”
“It isn’t,” he agreed. “I don’t think I even know who William Peters is now.” He was supposed to be William Peters, a husband and a father. A new father. With a new little boy.
He had practiced for months, reading storybooks to the mound that protected his son from the world, to his wife’s belly. He would point to pictures and teach words. He would do gruff voices and high voices and silly voices. And she would laugh and tell him what a wonderful father he would make, and he would tell her what a magnificent mother she would make. And they would laugh together and kiss and then fall asleep to dream of what life would be in a few months’ time. He planned the things he would teach his son—about the wonders of the galaxy and the beauty of the earth, about the importance of kindness and listening, about how people are different but we love them so very much because they are different.
And then on the very day when he should have become a father, it was taken away from him. So quickly. So unexpectedly. So cruelly. In a world where medicine could transplant wombs and regrow organs, it still could not prevent human error.
Not only would he not be a father, but he was also no longer a husband. In one moment. It was all gone, like the fluff of a dandelion blown away in a wish.
Yes, he remembered who he had been. But who was William Peters now?
“Identity” is available for the month of November 2026 on this site. The ebook is also available on most major online retail stores. You can also read this story in the collection Baverstock’s Allsorts Volume 2.
“Identity”
Copyright © Jessica Baverstock
Cover and Layout copyright © Jessica Baverstock
Cover design by Jessica Baverstock
Cover art © marinini/depositphoto.com, marchmeena/depositphoto.com, leremy/depositphoto.com
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.
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