The Weight
A short horror story about the weight of souls
Dr. Jack, November 4:
There is an epidemic of insomnia at the base. Insomnia itself is not unusual, the sun doesn’t set from October to February… newbies usually struggle for the first month. Add to that stress, overwork, homesickness, rotating shifts, and well, I’ve seen my fair share of sleepless scientists.
This is different. John Hoy’s been the facility manager for a decade, hasn’t slept in three days. Dr’s. Mako, Begam, and Mikula are going on a week now. Two research assistants, and one of the cooks, as well. Dr. Mako’s symptoms are the most severe as I think she’s been infected (?) the longest. What can this be besides a pathogen of some kind? These are scientists and professionals, not hysterical types. They don’t stamp your approval to an Antarctic mission if you’ve got bats in the belfry. The brilliant Dr. Hal Wright was denied for being “too mercurial.” Had to send an assistant. We all breathed fucking a sigh of relief…
The point is, I don’t think this is some fit of mass hysteria.
I’ll walk through Dr. Mako’s case up to now, supposed patient zero. She came to me last Wednesday, blood-shot eyes, dark circles, a slight tremor, heightened anxiety, and the curious belief that she could feel the base sinking into the ice. She hadn’t slept in two days. These are all normal symptoms for sleep deprivation. She hadn’t been able to fall asleep, but couldn’t say why. She’s a three-year veteran of the team, unlikely to be affected by the novelty of being in Antarctica. I quarantined her in the med bay and gave her some melatonin. No sleep. Upped the dosage to as much as was safe to give her, nothing. She was unable to sleep. We tried Quazepam, still no effect. It had now been seventy-two hours.
During this time, the other two doctors, Begam and Mikula had both also been admitted to the med bay. All three had been working in mud cores drawn up from the lakebed beneath the ice, another reason to suspect pathogens. Those mud cores have been quarantined and the lab cleaned, but it appears to have been too late. This pathogen spreads somehow or other, I’m still not sure how.
By day three Dr. Mako had to be restrained. She had become quite aggressive and hatched a belief that the base was sinking and the only way to stop it was to kill everyone inside. Something nonsensical about the weight of souls being too much for the ice. She’d have to set the souls free to save the base. I administered near dangerous levels of Quazepam, but to no avail. She was raving and her slight tremor had become more of a constant quaking.
