Let Them Burn

I am a whisper amidst the ocean.

I am lost in the sound of crashing waves, swallowed up and drowned within the merciless surge.

I did not ask to be here, to be but a sound echoing until it becomes a low hum, until I am nothing at all.

I did not ask for this pain, but pain is the only thing I received.

They are destroying me.

They are breaking me.

They are killing me.

Who’s they?

Who am I? What’s my name? Where am I? What is happening to me? Am I going insane?

I have no answers to speak of, so questions are all I have. My questions are the bandages that hastily pull my sanity together, patch me up but never fix. They give me something to focus on, something to hold on to, something to ponder as my life comes to pieces.

I feel as if I am floating, gazing upon the world in a hazy trance, with eyes that are not my own. My mind is an unsolvable jigsaw puzzle, and I spend my mornings turning the pieces this way and that, trying to make sense of the complex mess. But no matter what I do, it only shatters further, slowly disintegrating into the blank void it will one day become.

One day I’ll be completely insane. I wonder if it hurts less than this. Ignorance is bliss, right?

My father told me I should write in this journal. That I should take my scrambled thoughts and turn them into words.

I don’t really like him.

I don’t think he likes me either.

It will help me, he said. It will help lift the stress off my shoulders, he said. It’s a last ditch attempt to retain my sanity and improve my results, is what he didn’t say.

He couldn’t care less about my stress or well being. He studies me as I scream, and takes notes as I cry. He cares not of my thoughts and feelings but the DNA that constructs them. He saw my mood swings as infrequencies in the data, he saw my laughs as a rare outlier.

Huh.

When was the last time I laughed?

I think it was when they put me on those drugs. I couldn’t help it, and there was no humor in it. I started crying after that.

So now I have a notebook and a pencil. It’s an improvement from before, when I had nothing but myself, my thoughts, and my pain. My vast collection of belongings only keeps growing.

I am kept in the dark veil of ignorance for what is truly going on, left to wonder endlessly about my world. I wonder about the shackles that chain me to this cot, if I am trapped for a reason. I wonder about the careful tone in which father speaks to me, as if soothing a rabid beast. I wonder about the echoing screams as the scalpel makes contact with my abdomen, the sound that spills out of my throat whether I like it or not. I wonder about this searing, endless pain, if there is a way to numb it, if it will just kill me already.

I wonder If I’m dying.

I hear whispers.

Mouths move to form sounds, sounds that form words, words that form sentences.

They’re talking about their little science project.

I mean me.

“We need to get into her brain.” One of them says quietly. That’s strange. Do they want to break into my mind? Maybe they will meet my friend George in there.

George is a banana.

George is a friendly banana.

George is a figment of my imagination.

George is nonexistent, just as most true friends are.

At his mention, George nods vigorously in his spot in my subconscious. Then he returns to eating his cinder blocks. That’s his favorite snack.

George can be a bit weird sometimes.

The scalpel glints in the hand of the head surgeon, approaching slowly but surely. The surgeon is in the basic attire, with the scrubs and the face mask.

I scream until my throat goes dry. I don’t know why, as no one has touched me yet. Maybe it’s fear. Maybe my suffering has caught up with me. Or maybe it’s just out of habit. Bad habits die hard. I don’t even know where I heard that saying. Maybe Father said it one time. I don’t know exactly which bad habit he was referring to, as he has many to address.

The blade pauses, and the surgeons speak among each other.

I’m still screaming.

“We need the sedatives” The man to my right mutters. Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes put me to sleep. A sweet, dreamless sleep. Let my eyelids fall closed, let the fatigue weighing over me fade with rest.

I let out a satisfied sigh at the thought of it. Take me away from this pain, this world in general. Let darkness swallow me.

“There aren’t any in here!” The one on my left replies, closing the cabinet he was just looking through.

No no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no-

Okay.

I stop screaming. I don’t have any breath left for that. I wheeze in and out instead, the air leaving me behind one breath at a time. Like everyone else in my life, oxygen has decided to abandon me.

I need anything- anything to soothe this ache in my heart. It throbs violently, and it makes me want to scream all over again. My fingers twitch for no exact reason, shaking as they lay on the cot.

“All our sedatives are being saved for our wounded. We’re going to have to continue without them.” What wounded? Aren’t I wounded? Does mentally wounded count?

Probably not.

I’m not worth their supplies. Don’t waste your precious medications on me. Let me bear this pain. Hear my screams. Watch my cries. It’s okay. I don’t count as human, after all.

Maybe that’s what they tell themselves. Maybe that makes them feel better. Maybe they even believe it.

Lies are always easier to believe than the truth. The truth is much too painful.

I would know.

This project is for the sake of science. For whatever the hell they want to figure out. Is it me? Is there something wrong with me? Why am I the only one here? Maybe there are others, just that we are kept in separate rooms and not allowed to see each other. Maybe solitude is a part of the experiment. Another factor, an independent variable of our environment that affects our results. If there really is an our. Maybe I really am alone. Not knowing makes it all the more painful. How are people so sick?

The pain comes in an unbearable wave. A geyser of blood and horrors that come with the knife, cutting deeper and deeper.

Agony slices my mind right through, flooding into it with a great intensity.

Say hello to hell, George.

I want sedatives so badly I use all my strength to pry my mouth open to scream out my request. As if they would listen. Even if I did manage to find my voice that has decided to play hide and seek, it would get me nowhere.

I scroll through my head to try and find some cure for this pain, some switch to make me stop feeling. If there was a solution I do not find it, as I am much too busy screaming my head off.

I squint under the searing white light on the ceiling, a blinking ray of blaring energy. I focus on the inconsistencies in the power, leading my mind to anywhere but here. The fluorescent lights pour into my eyes, until blotches of color cloud my vision. I watch them float across the room, wondering if anyone else sees them. Blue, purple, green, all in different shapes. I blink, and I think they’re gone, but when I focus hard they reappear. I shift my eyesight back to the light. I count the amount of time it blinks. One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi, four Mississippi, five Mississippi, six Mississippi, seven Mississippi, eight Mississippi, nine Mississippi, ten Mississippi... I lost count. I was never great at math. But I continue to stare at it anyway.

Blink blink

I think I start screaming again. Sharp piercing screams that echo off the walls.

Blink blink

The world is red. Blood coats my vision, dripping off the edges.

Blink blink

I don’t feel the pain anymore.

Blink blink.

I think I’m going numb.

B l i n k b l i n k

Everything’s shaking. Is it an earthquake? Is it just me?

B lin k blin k

I hear a voice.

Soft, but sure.

Strange, but familiar.

Father.

Bl i nk bli nk

I wonder why he’s here.

B l i n k b l i n k

He’s telling me something, his gray eyes pouring into mine.

B lin k blin k

I can just make out what he’s saying.

Bl i nk bli nk

“Set this world ablaze, darling. Let them all burn”

Then I am whisked away by darkness.