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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/simbadweasel on 2024-10-15 22:11:27+00:00.
No one knew when she started, just that she had been clapping since she was admitted to the hospital three days ago. There was nothing physically wrong with her, CAT scans and MRI’s could reveal no reason why she was unable to stop. Neurological specialists and various experts were consulted and all walked away equally puzzled. She was admitted into the ER when she had stabbed through her left hand repeatedly with a fork while attempting to eat dinner.
“I’ve never seen anything like it” one nurse commented, “mentally she’s fine, she seems happy, if not a little scared... Muscle spasms aren’t uncommon in patients with developing neurological disorders such as Parkinson’s or Tourette’s,” she said while uncomfortably fiddling with her Leelo and Stitch lanyard, rolling the cords anxiously between her fingertips. “Ticks usually involve a measurable anxiety response in the brain, which we’ve been unable to detect. Which leads us to believe it’s psychological, but she doesn’t stop even when she’s sleeping.”
The first steps were obvious, she was sedated and restrained so that doctors could treat her stab wounds. But the stitching was complicated. Even in her heavily sedated state her fingers remained pointed straight out and her arms tugged at the restraints in synchronized rhythm, thrashing with increasing vigor growing more and more frustrated at their denial of a satisfying slap.
With the help of several nurses they were able to hold her still enough to stitch up her most egregious wounds. “She’s lucky that she was holding a fork instead of a knife,” the attending physician said, “the needle like stabs are much easier to treat than a deeper laceration. If the wounds were deeper, or had lacerated tendons then she would have a significantly longer recovery time, now the only thing she has to worry about is the bruising from repeated impacts.” The operation was frustrating, what was usually a 15 minute operation took around an hour and a half. Two nurses on either side of her, held down her restrained arms to limit the thrashing while the doctor carefully stitched and dressed her wounds in between her rhythmic spasms.
Once they had finished wrapping the gauze around her still pulsing hands, the attending nurses and doctors clapped customarily. As the applause died out in the operating room, a faint tapping noise was barely audible from outside. One of the interns watching the operation from the window could be lightly heard clapping through the glass. “Dr. Johansen, that’s enough.” The attending physician said.
“That was magnificent, bravo doctors! Bravo!” Dr. Johansen exclaimed with vigor. The staff looked at him confused, as he continued to clap enthusiastically. One of the concerned nurses approached, “Collin, that’s enough, please stop.” She held his hands together to end the rhythmic bashing. Effortlessly, he pried his hands apart and brought them back together. The nurse’s hands still clasped on the back of his, making her an unwilling accomplice in his digital flagellation. “I’ve seen it now, there’s no going back,” Dr. Johansen proclaimed, “We will all be delivered through the grace!”
The nurse spoke with an unnerved vibrato, “Collin, stop this!” she pleaded.
“Why? It’s beautiful!” Dr. Johansen spoke with a fanatical fervor. “Why would I stop?”
One of the nurses inside the operating Pointed to the unconscious patient. “Doctor look...”
They looked back to their patient, noticing that Dr. Johansen’s movements were perfectly synchronized with the unconscious patient’s.
The next report came from The cancer ward. Sunny the Clown had been making balloon animals for the children when his white gloved hands were brought together with enough force to pop a balloon giraffe as he was tying the knot at the crux of its neck. Some of the kids laughed at the clown’s mistake, while one young girl cried at the unexpected noise. One of the Parents clapped along with the clown. His teenage son pleaded with embarrassment, “It’s not that funny Dad, stop it.”
“But it is! It’s amazing!” His father replied, smiling with religious fervor.
His father ignored his plea, as he cried out in embarrassment, “what are you doing, Dad stop it. Everyone’s staring!” His father continued clapping in unison with the clown.
Reports of the plague trickled in spreading throughout the hospital. Seniors shattered the bones in their hands as nurses scrambled to respond. Thinking quickly one nurse was able to restrain the wrists of a patient with osteoporosis, but his thrashing didn’t stop. The nurse watched in shock as his fragile forearm snapped just below the wrist and he wriggled free of the restraint on his right. His hand dangled limply downward, dripping with blood as he swung to slap his still restrained left hand, his shattered forearm knocking back and forth like a Newtonian physics toy, with a wet slap off his palm.
A young Doctor volunteering to collect blood for the Red Cross stabbed a woman’s arm three times before she recoiled in panic. The young doctor, spike in hand, clapped uncontrollably until the needle broke off of the syringe, into his palm, and pushed out the other side in between the bones of his middle and ring finger.
The volume at the hospital increased by the hour as more cases spread through various wings. Nurses came in with earplugs. They spoke to each other in worried tones. The rhythmic pounding could be heard starting from down the hall or in the room next door, or in the same room. Some were able to find refuge from the unnerving sound for a moment, but theirs was a restless respite, undermined with an anxious anticipation for the next patient or colleague to fall to the plague’s hypnotic draw.
Nurses discussed in anxious deliberations who would be next. Rumors among the administration ran amok, “It has to be something in the water, some type of parasite or chemical affecting the brain,” One administrator theorized. Common theories echoed in the halls, “It’s the additives in our food,” “It’s a Russian psy-op,” “It’s the CIA experimenting on American citizens;” all spoken with a clueless desperation that made every theory as valid as the next.
Nurse Carlita spoke up to her peers, “hush now, there’s only one explanation, this is divine retribution. This godless country has gone too far and this plague is the first of our punishments, just like in Egypt, there will be more to come. It’s only through begging forgiveness from the lord that we might absolve ourselves of his divine wrath.” She pulled a bundle of sage from her scrubs and handed leaves to the other nurses huddled around her. One of them started clapping, their confusion amplified through their helplessness.
News reports played on the TVs in each room that the plague had spread outside of the hospital. Vagrants on the street clapped ceaselessly like crickets in tall grass. Cars crashed into each other as the drivers couldn’t hold on to the steering wheel. News anchors spoke in discordant syllables as their editors muted the rhythmic sounds of their hands pulsing together under their desks.
Dr. Stewart decided that he had had enough. Something was happening and he was helpless to resist it. “I don’t care what oaths I swore,” he sputtered, “I’m not sticking around here waiting to maim myself or worse. I’m going as far away from this as I can!” He quick stepped out of the hospital as people in the waiting room applauded him, even through their smiling facades, he could see their eyes begging for relief from their swollen palms and battered eardrums. He walked out of the hospital, aimlessly down the street, as a truck crashed into the embankment across the road.
With no other options, he ran home. Strategically weaving his way down the street to put as many obstacles between him and motorists who could lose control at random. Nowhere was safe, his heart raced and he could hear the pounding of colliding palms from apartments and retail stores that he passed by. The concrete around him was speckled with droplets of blood, flung haphazardly from the bloodied palms, swollen and raw from continuous impacts.
He rounded the final corner to his home, and that’s when he saw it.
He collapsed on his knees struck by its sheer mind warping extravagance. “My God!” He cried to himself, “This is rapturous! The sublime exuberance of staring into the face of God himself, Human minds were never equipped to handle this... this, this is the peak of existence, when all words fail, this shall carry us home. This is what will save our wretched souls!” he grasped his head in amazement as tears streamed down his eyes. He Brought his palms together as he screamed, “Yes! Yes!” His cries and applause could be heard blocks away.
Above him a billboard loomed in a bright, glowing red, “McRib is Back! Now for a Limited Time Only.”