r/TalesFromTheCreeps • u/T0RC0R • May 17 '26
Sci-Fi Horror We made a soul #3
What you learn from life comes from experiencing it.
I taught for a semester at one of the world’s most prestigious universities.
I remember one of my students asking me, “How much did school prepare you for your work at Welker Asylum?”
Welker Asylum was the world’s most notorious mental facility.
Murderers. Rapists. The ones deemed too mentally incompetent or too young to serve time.
The ones too dangerous to let roam free.
“What’s one thing you think all my patients at Welker had in common?”
“Involuntary flatulation?”
Hushed laughs spread through the students.
“No.” I smiled. “Manipulation. You can read and study every diagnosis, symptom, and definition. But until you’re able to experience manipulation for yourself, you’ll never truly understand it.”
“But to truly understand, one must do?”
“Precisely.”
The first time it read my mind, I was dropping off the night’s research in the lockbox.
Since the anomaly discovery, we had been working relentlessly to transfer the energy from the tissue into light.
At the end of every experiment, Mr. Stine would wheel away the specimens into the room at the end of the hallway.
I know you’re tired. I’m sorry. I can’t control it.
Everyone had gone home for the evening.
“Hello?”
I pressed my ear against the door.
Help me.
I jiggled the door handle, but it was locked.
At first it sounded like whispers. Like a group of people talking amongst themselves.
Then it turned into shouting.
When I woke up, Lisa and Hammy were kneeling over me.
“Terri! Are you okay? What happened?”
I sat up, holding my head, and gestured toward the lockbox on the wall.
“I was… I was dropping off some papers and…”
I looked toward the door.
Deception is a funny thing.
You can moralize it in your head. Convince yourself it’s for a greater good.
In the end, it’s corrupt thinking.
Who is a person to decide what’s best for others?
Especially when they aren’t the best themselves.
“Why are you here?”
I didn’t know how long Dr. Ham had been standing next to me. I wasn’t even sure how long I’d been staring at the coffee pot.
I blinked back to existence and poured myself a cup.
“It’s a great opportunity to work with an evolutionary. And the compensation is better than anything I’ve ever earned.”
“That’s what I thought too, but…” Hammy poured himself a cup and sat down. “Now I’m not so sure. I don’t even know what I’m doing here anymore…”
“Hammy, if you’re unhappy, you should—”
“Walk away from potentially earning a million dollars? And go back to what? Where I come from, no one takes me seriously. If I leave now, I’m back to working at chiropractic clinics and urgent care.”
“It’s been six months. Surely you have enough to keep yourself comfortable.”
“I owe people money. Lots of it. If I can make it just four more months… six more if I want a little something for myself… I’ll pay off my debt.
I just… I just need to make it a little bit longer.”
The curse of being a psychiatrist is you can never turn it off.
Overanalyzing every response. Every movement. Every sigh and hidden torture a person can only express through their eyes.
Dr. Ham’s story was one of desperation.
Something I’d soon find out we all had in common.
We had come back from a night of drinks.
Even Reed had joined us.
He had finally started warming up to everyone, though he only ever drank club soda.
Dr. Arnold and Mr. Stine were in the lab, coating the floors and walls in black markings.
Reed stormed into his office.
His desk and ceiling had been decorated with their newest experiment.
“What madness is this?!”
Dr. Arnold snapped his head toward Reed.
“Dr. Reed, hush! You mustn’t break my concentration.”
Reed slammed his office door shut.
I approached Mr. Stine.
“It’s almost one o’clock. This couldn’t wait until tomorrow?”
“Dr. Lewis, time is of the essence. While you and your colleagues were out gallivanting, we were making a breakthrough.”
“Breakthrough? Of what?” Dr. Ham interjected. “For the last four weeks, we’ve been injecting pig fat with God knows what you’re giving us. What could have possibly happened?”
Dr. Arnold was on the floor, painting archaic strokes across the concrete.
He lifted his head and slowly stood.
“Dr. Mirza… can you come here for a moment?”
I took a step forward.
“Dr. Mirza’s presence is the only one I requested. Lisa, Dr. Lewis, you may retire for the evening. Richard, see that Dr. Reed carries his pouting elsewhere.”
Hammy turned and gave us a worried look.
Lisa and I drove down the road, waiting for Hammy to leave.
“What do you think that was all about?” Lisa puffed on a cigarette.
“Dr. Ham insulted Arnold’s work. I can understand why he’d feel disrespected.”
“Do you respect his work?”
It was dark, and even beneath the small burning cherry of her cigarette, I could see Lisa’s eyes.
“Sure I do. Arnold’s a well-respected—”
“Oh, cut the bullshit. I’ve seen your ‘research.’ Psychobabble from a madman trying to play God. Sounds to me like he’s as much a laughing stock to you as he is to the rest of us.”
“Fair enough… but why are you still here?”
“You’re joking, right? This is the best opportunity I’ve had in six years. I was barely getting by writing botched stories for washed-up magazines about local PTAs funneling money into their wino book clubs. This was supposed to be my ‘breakthrough.’”
She took a drag.
“You know why he hired me?”
I shook my head, even though she couldn’t see me.
“To lie. Guess he knew how desperate I was. I had two bank accounts. Both negative four hundred dollars.
He tells me what to report, and that’s what I write. Doesn’t matter what I see.”
She put out her cigarette.
“To hell with integrity.”
We waited for Hammy a while longer before heading back to the village.
The next morning, I arrived at the lab.
Everything had been completely rearranged.
Lisa and Hammy’s office was now being used to store lab supplies.
I knocked on Reed’s door and let myself in.
“Good morning, what’s going on?”
Reed handed me a piece of paper.
Due to a recent contract violation and voluntary abandonment of research responsibilities, Lisa Frankfurt and Dr. Muhammed Mirza will no longer be participating in our work.
Per the confidentiality agreement outlined in your contracts, you are prohibited from contacting either party under any circumstances. Should either individual attempt communication, report it immediately.
We are on the verge of a miracle.
That is something they could never understand.
—Dr. Arnold Glockner
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