Electrode in the Brain

By Claire Quinley F10

“You are unnatural.”
Grazinsky scratched his scab.
“Unnatural, I am? Detective Yates, what is unnatural is that thing on your head.”

He pointed to the grey metallic headband.

“Mr. Grazinksy, the neurosynthesizer is more than a mere ‘thing’. Your neighbors—”

“My neighbors can go space themselves.”

Yates smiled coolly and took a very long drag of his invisible cigarette. Grazinsky again scratched the fresh scab on the back of his head.

“Your neighbors were concerned for you. I am only here to help, Mr. Grazinsky.”

“For me, concerned? Mr. Yates, I hardly call throwing me in a prison cell, so you can force one of those soul suckers onto my skull, ‘concern’.”

“This is an interrogation room. Your neighbors wanted this handled delicately and the department agrees. You haven’t been formally arrested.”

Grazinsky narrowed his eyes. He stood with his fists on the table. Yates leaned back in his stiff chair on the opposite end.

“And don’t use such vulgar terminology, Mr. Grazinsky. The neurosyn is proven safe and is, moreover, necessary for a healthy responsible lifestyle.”
“Healthy, it is? Listen to yourself, man. Or maybes it’s just Mr. detective. You’re quoting my TV verbatim.”
Yates maintained his cool smile.
“Do you mean to say you have a television, Mr. Grazinsky?”
Grazinsky bit his lip.
“Mr. Grazinsky I don’t think I need to remind you that in addition to removing your neurosyn, it is illegal to have a television.”

“Detective, you’re going to get the truth eventually; I haven’t ever turned my neurosyn on. But look, I’m an old man. That headband of yours, it’s worthless to me. The TV, that’s an object of personal value, a throwback from my sweet boyhood memories.”

“It’s an obscene waste of electricity, Mr. Grazinsky.”

“But you’re on the other side of fifty yourself, no? Surely you know what I mean—”

Yates became abrupt.
“Mr. Grazinsky I haven’t the slightest idea what you mean. Neurosyns are the only legal civilian devices for receiving any broadcast.”
Grazinsky smiled honestly.

“Oh, come on Mr. Yates. You’re plenty old enough, don’t you have a sweet memory or two from the old days?”

Yates stood up. Grazinsky chuckled.

“Have I offended you? I’m impressed, I didn’t think anyone could feel anything anymore.”

“You are right, I am difficult to offend. Congratulations. But know this: I am here as a courtesy to you and your friends, Mr. Grazinsky. But if you continue to be obscene I will place you under arrest.”

Yates stared at Grazinsky. Grazinsky frowned. Both sat down.

“To the point, then. Mr. Grazinsky, televisions, motor vehicles, paper, these are artifacts of the Dark Age—”

“You mean your boyhoo—”

Yates stared.

“Um, sorry… Continue.”

“These are artifacts of the Dark Age that today’s world could simply not sustain. The neurosyn replaces the need for all of them; it prevents the urge to waste. It is your duty not only to your friends and family, but to your extended family, humanity, to wear one. ”

“Detective Yates, convincing as you sound, can I tell you something?”

“Be careful, Mr. Grazinsky.”

“I think the soulsu—the neurosyn is really great, I really do. Why, with that little headband of yours you can do anything, be anywhere…”

“Then why, Mr. Grazinsky, do you not wear one?”

“Well that’s my point. Used to be you could only type and get the net on those things. People hardly ever wore them. You still had to drive to work and stop at lights and get harassed by those giant vidboards—”

“Dark times.”

“Yes, well. So then the billboards disappear and now they’re on the neurosyn. Why on earth would you wear one? Well then the traffic lights end up in the neurosyn, and the steering wheel too, so you have to wear one in the car.”

“In the interest of safety, Mr. Grazisnky.”

Yates sounded amiable again.

“Quite. So the vidboards are taken down, and I mean every kind, and New York turns into a bunch of blank concrete-and-steel cubes. And you can’t even tell an arms plant from a daycare center. But not if you wear a neuorsyn, because all that fluorescence can still be there in your head. And that’s where it stops, they say.”

Grazinsky stood up.

“They won’t compromise reality, they say. They have restraint, ‘standards’, they say!”

“Yes, but Mr. Grazinsky, times were different. People were less… open minded.”

“So they were. But neurosyns couldn’t fully project back then, and you still had a job to get to. But then the cars go too, and then the buses. But happy days!”

He began pacing.

“They decided to keep on advancing neurosynthesis anyways and voila, ‘work’ as you know it disappears. Your entire office is in your head. Full projection! The fuel problem solved! What are most people but the proverbial pencil-pusher? Let machines tend the wheat, deliver the groceries. Work from home! It’s not indolence, it’s Invirosyn!”

“I still haven’t heard your point, Mr. Grazinsky.”

“Okay detective, I’m almost there. So then they have full projection, Invirosyn, and people love it so much no one wants to put the skids on neurosynthesis research anymore. Restraint becomes a dirty word. So no one’s there to stop them when they put not only your office in that thing, but Athens Greece, and then places that don’t even exist. Mr. Yates, have you looked outside recently?”

“Yes, when I arres—when I picked you up.”

“What did you see?”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Any people?”

“I can’t recall. What’s your point?”

“That’s my point. You don’t even know because all you see is what that damn thing lets you! There was no one outside, Mr. Yates. Ten years ago there were a few, but now there’s no one. And even when you see people, they don’t see you; its like their eyes are all glassed-over. The neurosyns get better, and it gets worse, all the time. And it’s so bad now I don’t even know what it's going to be like in five years.”

“I think you’re confused, Mr. Grazinsky. The streets appear bare only because you do not wear your neurosyn. I assure you they would look quite different if you did. And if you wanted, as you yourself said, you could confirm this in Athens as well, without even leaving this room.”

Grazinsky exploded.

“No, I couldn’t. Because I wouldn’t be IN GODDAMN ATHENS!”

He stopped, an embarrassed fear crossing his face. Yates remained calm.

“I—I’m sorry, but that’s how I feel detective.”

“Don’t apologize, Mr. Grazinsky. I believe I understand you now, if I may explain. You remember the Dark Age, you grew up in it, as have many others. It is inevitable that despite the best efforts of people such as your neighbors and myself, in a few people, a certain small… nostalgia might remain. You idolize something that’s called ‘pseudorealism’. A savage feeling, no doubt, but also innocent. You have no wish to harm others, but something about the old ideals appeals to you. But you must understand the danger that appeal represents.”

“Oh? Have you had to arrest anyone recently detective? I mean, you and I, for our own reasons we have to keep moving, stay in shape. But not most people. I’m at the frail age of sixty seven and I could overpower a twenty year old today.”

“I hope you haven’t actually considered that. My last arrest was five years ago, someone much like you. He too wouldn’t wear his neurosyn, and then he got that idea in his head. No reason really, he just began to murder everyone in his apartment.”

Grazinsky froze. Yates’ calm expression didn’t change.

“Mr. Grazisnky, do you know why that was my last arrest? The neuorsyn hasn’t just brought happiness; it has brought order. They are the same. You don’t understand, but if only you would wear it, really wear it, you would know what it is to be truly happy.

"And it’s important for your mental health. Dark Age humans even killed each other in pursuit of that happiness. Sometimes they killed to destroy it. They were jealous, hateful creatures. Their reality was inevitable suffering. I imagine almost all of them would qualify as mentally insane today.

"But their reality is not the only one. There is no longer need for jealousy. The places the neurosyn can bring you, the happiness it can bring you, they are just as real as that desolate street outside. More, even. That man, who slaughtered an apartment full of people, he clung to his harsh reality, alone. He hated us for our joy. He even admitted he would do it again the minute we released him. He had become an animal.

"Don’t you see, Mr. Grazinsky? Even proto-humans had their wheel. Without this machine, people aren’t whole.”

Grazinsky more whispered than spoke.

“Detective, what happened to the man?”

“We put him down. We had no choice. Which brings me to you. I am wondering if you, too, are a danger to society?”

Grazinsky turned white.

“Perhaps now you understand why it became illegal to remove the neurosyn. It’s a case I have seen many times. It starts with innocent criticism, nostalgia, like yours. But the only possible outcome is insanity.”

Grazinsky’s voice began to crack.

“Detective, are you threatening me with death?”

“No, Mr. Grazinsky. I am only informing you of the inevitable. So, please, will you wear the neurosyn?”
Grazinsky was plainly scared but he did not hesitate.
“No, detective. I had my answer prepared before you took me here. I think you’re right, not one person on this earth hates another. But you know what? I don’t believe a single person on this earth loves another. I’m ready for the consequences. If I must die, I will do it as a free man.”

Yates’ eyes became glassy and unfocused. Grazinsky waited a few moments before waving his hand.

“Hello, detective, are you here?”

Another moment passed. Yates almost seemed to nod, and then his eyes became sharp again.

“Who were you talking to?”

“My superior. The decision has been made. Have you said everything you needed to?”

“Mr. Yates, I realize now there is nothing more to say.”

“Very well, follow me.”

Grazinsky half-leaned a moment, half facing the door, half facing Yates. Yates withdrew his handgun and Grazinsky chose the door, walking slowly.

The room was a perfect cube of six white-tiled walls. The chair was in the middle. Two technicians attended to Grazinsky while Yates and several others watched in another room, behind a one-way glass panel. Yates made no visible motion, spoke no audible word, but a speaker in the square room activated, and projected his voice for Grazinsky.
“It will be absolutely painless, Mr. Grazinsky, you have my word. It’s a new model, meant specifically for people like you.”
Grazinsky stared up, at the single florescent dome illuminating the room. A technician strapped a mask and tube assembly to Grazinsky’s mouth. The gas began to flow. Until then Grazinsky had not spoken, but through the muffled hiss of the gas, he whispered.
“Free man… free man…”

The light burned like the sun.

Dorian Grazinsky remembered the green grass of a field sixty years ago. New York was in the distance, still colorful, shimmering like fish scales. He remembered old couples sitting in the shades of the elms, the older boys and girls kissing in the bushes, and the children running and chasing until they dropped from exhaustion. He had been one of these. He remembered his brother Eric, and their game of chase, and simple joy. The back of Eric’s shirt flapped madly in the wind, which carried Eric’s delighted squeals to Dorian and mixed them with his own. Dorian loved the chase so much he was afraid to catch that shirt, to lose interest. But Eric had always been faster, and the game always lasted until little Dorian had let himself fall on his back and stare upwards, gasping, feeling the grass in both fists, feeling his chest rise and fall.

And Dorian remembered himself there on the ground, staring at the sun, the game over the way it should be. Mother and Father watched from the shade and little Margaret had left them to come to stand over him. Her head was entrancingly dark and dizzied Dorian as it cast a shadow on him. He stared up at her until it became clearer, until he could make out the thumb in her mouth and the pigtails on her shoulders. Dorian remembered her as the sweetest human being alive.

“You okay, Dorian?”

“Yea Margaret, I’m okay. Go back to mommy.”

“’Kay.”

She ran away. She ran back.

“Dorian?”

“Uhuh?”

“I love you.”

She ran away.

Dorian had been getting better at holding back his tears, but this time it didn’t work. He cried, but it wasn’t the mad-cry, or the sad-cry. It was a new cry he didn’t understand.

And as Margaret had left, the sun had taken her place.

Grazinsky woke up in his apartment. The itch on the back of his head was even more intense now, demanding attention. But first, he knew, he had to get a glass of milk. He went to his kitchen and then remembered he hadn’t had a refrigerator in twenty years. He went frantically to the faucet and poured himself a lukewarm glass of water. He drank it greedily, and felt the familiar taste, cool, and almost sweet. Grazinsky paused. He inspected his glass. It was clearly water.

“But that taste…”

Dorian Grazinsky reached back to scratch his scab and felt the cool metal band there in its place.
He did not die a free man.