Serious mental problems are common today and sufferers rely on the help of doctors to align their actions to more normal functions and associations with other humans. These people suffer in a prison of their own minds and lose all attachments to their former selves, when normal human function was passively achievable. And it seems that it can happen to any of us, and for many different reasons.
The mind is a maze that we can hardly comprehend. It is a thought exercise in itself; how can we comprehend the very thing that gives us comprehension? It’s like a dog chasing his tail, and sure, maybe one day we’ll catch our tails, but wouldn’t that cause us pain? It’s a necessary endeavor, though, to give hope to those in the throes of Alzheimer’s, depression, mania, schizophrenia, or bipolar disorder. The list is long, the things that can trap us in the maze of the mind, and there are efforts underway across the US to navigate the mysterious cognitive labyrinth.
The Institute for Brain Function in rural Georgia, the exact location is not public knowledge, is an offshoot of the Center for Disease Control, and is comprised of many doctors and scientists who perform cutting edge drug trials and surgeries to treat mental disorders and brain trauma. They also dedicate considerable time and effort to detailed mapping and function assessment of the human brain.
“Nebuchad? Nebuchad, are you listening to us?”
They do what they can to help people, though some are only interested in the advancement of the science.
“He’s acknowledging me. Nebuchad, where are you right now?”
Some only care about attaching their names to prestige. Some will do anything to gain acclaim.
“My location? I am located in area Zg 82, known to the prominent sentient species of humans beings on their planet Earth as the Milky Way Galaxy, circling a star known as Sun. Specifically on Earth, I am on the North American continent, in the United States of America.“
“He knows where he is but seems to have created details about the location of the planet Earth within the greater cosmos. Nebuchad, explain to me what you mean when you say that you are located in area Zg 82.”
“You know where we are, yet you ask. Why is that?“
There are all kinds at the IBF, the two doctors currently interviewing Nebuchad in a private room in the basement level are not completely devoid of empathy toward their charge, they both want to do a good and thorough job and maybe even free Nebuchad from his mental illness that was caused by a drug he’d taken one night at a club. But the doctors are ultimately working hard to impress their teacher, the brilliant Dr. Thomas Eakran who is known for his advanced theories in every discipline of science related to the human mind. They know that they want to be a man like him, providing insights that will lead to the alleviation of the worst mental afflictions.
“Nebuchad, we are happy to see you well today. Can you tell me why you are here with us?”
“You know very well why I am here.“
“I want to hear it from you.”
“Soon, all will be clear; for now, I am here because you believe that I am afflicted. “
“I believe that you have been drugged and that the experience had a lasting affect on your ability to engage with others”
“I am here. I am only here now.“
“Nebuchad, do you remember taking the drug?”
“I am only here now.“
The man interviewing Nebuchad is Dr. Frederick Cousins and when Nebuchad suddenly convulses and falls to a pile on the floor at his feet, Cousins is at Nebuchad’s side to be sure that he does not swallow his tongue. When Nebuchad stops convulsing he is a bull, Cousins can see it in his eyes. They go wide and it seems that he cannot see anything at all, and he is focusing all of his mental activity on making real the imagined grasses in his mouth that he chews intently by moving his jaw in a steady circular motion.
This is a normal day for Eakran’s assistant doctors; Nebuchad is just their first stop in the long list of active cases Eakran is investigating. Cousins has aspirations to cure Alzheimers for personal reasons and Moss got into neuroscience because of the vast amount of information that has yet to be uncovered. Moss is chasing a legacy, she wants nothing more than to change the face of medicine forever, and after years of study, she finally decided that the key to unlocking the secrets of our existence was to delve into the mind’s mysteries. The human mind is a God Machine in her view, meaning that it is practically a magic trick considering our current understanding of its machinations. We are not completely clueless though, we have a decent enough understanding, but it’s similar to our exploration of the Earth’s oceans; we have been deep into the waters and yet there are still many depths left undiscovered. Moss had no desire to submerge herself in the high pressures of the deep seas, not when she could intern at the Mayo Clinic as she did after graduating from medical school. She met Cousins at the Mayo Clinic and the two are like long lost siblings. They seem to share the same points of reference in their definitions of comedy; they were both teenagers in the nineties and had an affinity for the nerd humor of The Simpson and Conan O’Brien. They started work for Eakran after discovering the Aliarum Pattern in a group of dementia patients in Minnesota that Eakran had happened upon more than a decade before and was conducting top secret research on three test subjects in the IBF basement.
Cousins and Moss lead Nebuchad back to his room that has light padding on the off-white walls. One of the walls has a large flat screen TV hanging from it and Nebuchad never watches it when it’s on. Cousins had observed Nebuchad through the window on his door when he was lucid and believed himself to be alone, and sometimes he seemed to be so engaged in thought as he paced the floor, talking to himself about the societies of far off galaxies that could teach human beings important lessons to catch up to the best of the sentient universe. Once, Nebuchad startled Cousins; he had been ranting about Earth’s paltry defenses, how we could not even fend off the Fhetatians if by some crazy stroke of fate they happened upon the slipstream and made it to Earth for the sloppy and inefficient take over that they were well known for. Cousins was wrapt up in Nebuchad’s specificity, when suddenly he hit the glass window.
“What are you doing here? Why are you watching me when you should be watching the heavens? They are pregnant with threats, they will soon give birth and smear this weak planet with the blood of its parasites, or singe the whole thing to cinders. What are you doing here? You could be saving us. They are already here. You must save Maria.“
Cousins nearly jumped out of his skin; the look in Nebuchad’s eyes was truly frightening. Cousins felt sorry for Nebuchad and wanted to understand the root of his delusions, he thought that maybe he could draw Nebuchad out of them.
“Who is Maria?” Cousins said through his nerves that were all piqued.
But Nebuchad’s periods of cogent speaking are always interrupted by the bull spells, and before he could answer, he was on the floor, chewing on his imagination.
“He’s not having seizures, Donna.” Cousins says as the two doctors leave Nebuchad in his room.
“Yes, but what is it? We’ve done so many scans Rick, there doesn’t seem to be any damage to the brain, there’s no trace of anything in his system. I want to do some reading. He took that drug over a year ago.”
Moss enters the complex code to exit the secure section of the basement level, then takes the elevator up to the office the two share on the second floor of the IBF where she pours through literature hoping to find anything like the symptoms she observes in Nebuchad.
Cousins goes to the observation room and sits in the comfortable chair that the patients use when he and Moss talk with them for evaluations. It is soft and something about the base of it allows it to gently rock. It’s nothing like the couch most people associate with therapy, the one that allows you to put your feet up and lay back into your subconscious. Cousins and Moss are meant to carefully document the actions and responses of their patients, so the comfortable chair feels more conducive to standing up should the patient feel compelled to do so. The doctors document the effects of treatment on their patients’ various conditions (for lack of a better blanket word to categorize the diverse caseload) for Eakran who studies the data with assistance from Cousins and Moss in order to produce the breakthroughs that he is known for. Nebuchad’s case is a government assignment, Eakran is meant to document the effects of the previously unknown drug for the CDC and to assist the DEA in their investigation into the drug’s origin. Cousins had been baffled by it from the start. The chemical structure of the drug that Cousin’s managed to extract from Nebuchad’s blood was odd, unlike any he’d ever seen, though the actual components seemed to be familiar; he identified traces of LSD and MDMA. The little information that the doctors have been able to uncover so far has been confusing to them. Nebuchad acts as a man permanently damaged by drugs would, though his body shows no physical damage. The doctors have enough experience to know that Nebuchad is not faking his symptoms, but they are having a difficult time explaining the man’s malady.
Cousins is still curious about Maria, the name Nebuchad mentioned the day he hit the window on the door of his room. Cousins wonders if it is someone close to Nebuchad and if she could talk to him and help him reorient his perspective. Of course he would have to find her first.
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