Boateh agreed. "I do insist that my staff exercise regularly."
I was astonished. "They're
exercising
?! But what about the sick pa—"
"What good are we to our patients if we do not maintain ourselves?"
I smiled sheepishly, realizing he was absolutely right.
He stroked his forelock.
As we approached the reception area, Dr. Boateh pointed out a rectangular room adjacent to the outside wall. "That room is always kept vacant."
"Why?"
"So we will never be out of rooms."
I could feel my brow furrow again. "You mean as a symbolic gesture that the hospital always has room for one more in a time of need?"
"No, no. Hadn't thought of that—nice touch; I like it. I'll mark that one down for marketing." He examined me through his lorgnette before continuing. It made me feel…
odd
. But in a good way.
"Not much of a mathematician, are you?" He chuckled.
"No, actually… No."
"The sheer beauty of this can only be found in a system of structure." He was beaming. "It's simple, my friend; if we need more rooms, we simply remove a room."
"Ah, how's that?"
"This room is much like a rectangle, except for the curved outer wall—which is neither here nor there. And I mean that. But I ask you, how do we increase our surface area?"
"Hmmm… by adding on?"
"No, no. By
removing
! Think about it."
Puzzlement must have shown on my face for he continued explaining.
"If we take away one of the outer walls of an outer room, then that space would open up into five adjacent walls in a space that used to make up the boundary between the room and the rest of the structure. Ergo, by excision, we have now increased our surface area fivefold!"
I blinked. Rapidly.
"It is called
The Doxy's Paradox
."
"Huh?" I was still foggy on the concept.
His third eye teared up with mirth. "Too many sailors—not enough rooms!"
I rolled my eyes. "
Ow
."
"You know," Boateh continued amiably, "There was a doctor of bio-psychology from Earth—a Dr. Schwartzchild—who used
The Doxy's Paradox
as a basis for his research."
"Are you sure? I was under the impression that Dr. Schwartzchild calculated the radius inside of which the attraction between a body's particles will induce an irreversible gravitational collapse; i.e. a black hole. Strangely enough, his name, when broken down to
schwarzes schild
, translates from the German to English language as 'black shield'. Destiny or coincidence? The argument is still rages in university cafeterias across the—" Boateh shook his head. "Different chap altogether. The good fellow you're talking about might be an ancestor. As your wise Newton once said, 'the apple will not bounce away from the tree'!"
"I don't think that was what he actually—" Boateh peered at me through his lorgnette. "As I was saying, Dr. Schwartzchild's research utilized the Doxy Theory within his own field of bio-psychology."
He had my full attention. "In what possible way?"
"Well, the brain has all those pesky convolutions which increase the surface area of the happy gray matter. Alluding to Doxy, Schwartzchild believed that if a core sample could be removed from the brain, then the surface area would be significantly enlarged. Although the seat of intelligence is still in debate, Schwartzchild maintained that increasing this surface area would categorically lead to an increase of intelligence!" I swallowed. "Did he attempt the experiment?"
"Oh yes. And at first it
seemed
successful… so, naturally, he continued the process. Over much controversy, I might add."
"I can imagine."
"He hoped to prove that if succeedingly
smaller
sections of brain tissue were removed, then surface area would become larger still—until eventually, infinite intelligence would be achieved…" He stroked his forelock. "Of course, ultimately, you would have no brain left to speak of at all. Isaac Asimov asked, 'What was mind?' And answered himself with, 'No matter'."
"He also asked, 'What is matter?"
Boateh waved his tentacle. "No mind. One must wonder if Einstein, himself, was almost brainless… and yet, they say his brain had more mass than the average bear. Literally, do you think?"
He seemed awed by the whole prospect.
"The entire subject seems impossible to me," I flatly stated.
"But
probable
in theory. The mathematical community endowed Schwartzchild with a grant." He looked down at me through his glass. "
Quite a large grant
."
"Where is he now?"
"He's a patient here."
I missed my step.
"Would you like to meet him?"
"Perhaps later, Doctor. Perhaps later."
We curved around the corridor to the first of the patient rooms on the tour. Outside of Room 1313, we gazed through the window at the hapless being within.
"What's the pathology?" I whispered even though I
knew the patient couldn't hear me through the sound barrier.
"A case of too many personalities."
"As in multiple personality disorder?"
"Not exactly the same. This Kneph displays multiple-multiple personality disorder. "
"How bizarre; what are the symptoms?"
"Knephs have six separate and distinct personalities. Normally, we see the lover, the intellectual, the artist, the prolocutor, the poet, and the master chef. This poor Kneph's psyche has fractured into two additional personalities, which we have identified as the loner and God. We endeavor to cure this."
"Amazing." I frantically scribbled some notes into my reporter's notebook; they were immediately absorbed into my Apple fingerbook/pinkypod.
"Right now, this Kneph is due for his anti-grav bath." He lowered his voice to a confidential murmur. "They sleep like
Suet
afterwards." He grinned.
Suet spent 100% of their lives snoring in mud—it was a good analogy. I wrote it down in the fingerbook and grinned back.
I looked into the next room. Three chaps sat facing each other, apparently having a heated staring contest. I recognized their species as Yutz; although I only had a passing acquaintance with this species. They usually seemed friendly enough; but in a really annoying sort of way.
Yutz were often called 'four eyes'. Not because they wore spectacles.
They actually had four eyes.
Their eye sockets were located within the tips of filament-like tentacles. (I had often seen them wave about after a few good drinks in a bar! But I digress…) All twelve of these tendril/orbs were locked together with the intent of staring down the facing eyeball. None of the eyes blinked.
"Lock and load."
"What's their condition, Doc?"
"He's schizophrenic."
"And the other two?"
"There's only one Yutz in there."
"Excuse me, Dr. Boateh, but I see three distinct beings in there."
"Of course you do; however, there is only one patient in there!"
"Now I'm really confused."
"Allow me to elaborate. Yutzes are. . . well, you're from Earth originally, are you not?"
"My ancestral line, yes."
"I believe there was a fungus on Earth called yeast—are you familiar with it?"
"Of course I am. Yeast is very important to—"
"Well, Yutzes are similar to yeast—in their physiological and psychological makeup."
"Get out of here. Yeast are unicellular fungi that—"
"I am serious. Naturally, a Yutz is much more complex than yeast…" He stroked his forelock. "I'll try to put it in layman's terms… Sometimes yeast cells will secrete a thickened wall. A barrier. During this time, inside a single cell, the cytoplasm will divide into four cells, which emerge after the barrier is ruptured. The point is, when a Yutz suffers a break down—like yeast—it really breaks down. Into three separate parts. One part retains the ego; another, the id, and the final part retains the superego."
"That's fascinating! If only Freud and the psychoanalyst formerly known as
&
knew about—"
"Yes, but it gets better." His third eye twinkled. "In this species, one part cannot function without the other two parts. Once the unconscious division of the psyche physically separates with the breakdown, all functioning ceases. The Yutz is forced to sit and stare at himself; his counterparts."
"What is he looking for?"
"From what we can tell, each part is simultaneously trying to figure out what is so special about the other two parts that make them vital to its survival."
"Is it curable?"
"It is difficult; but, eventually, yes. Unfortunately, this patient has a long way to go. At this stage, each part is not willing to give up its hold on distinct existence."
"Even though all they do is stare at each other?"
"Oh, it can go on like this for some time; often a stalled Yutz can do nothing for eons. And there is no talking him out of it."
"Sad."
"When he is ready… when he is ready. Shall we move on?"
Boateh led us to the next window.
Wrapped in a Hidoan straight jacket, this poor soul was rocking back and forth, constantly muttering.
"Now this patient was a noted astronomer on its home world of Ekootay. A portion of its research was in the monitoring of incoming signals from space. I believe Ekootayans are seeking out new alien life forms not previously contacted by the Consortium."
"What happened to it?"
"We don't exactly know. It underwent some kind of breakdown—that is all we have been able to determine. As you see, we were forced to use restraints to keep it from pulling out the tufts of its fur."
"Tsk-tsk. What is it mumbling?"
"Well, it keeps repeating, '
What hath god wroth!'
. Over and over. No one can figure out what it is driving at—I mean, well, what is its point?"
He stroked his forelock.
I captured the powerful image with my pinkypod cam.
"Doctor, perhaps this is a good place to take a small break and discuss treatment—would you mind if we talk about that for a while?"
"I would welcome it. What would you like to know?"
"Well, for a start, the types of protocols used and—"
"For the most part, we employ the usual treatments such as analysis—Did you have feelings for your procreator's cohabiter? That kind of thing. Of course we use medication whenever we can… and in the most recalcitrant cases, a lazerotomy is sometimes called for." He lifted his lorgnette to his third eye. "To cut out the bad parts."
I gulped. "And if that doesn't work…?"
He became most grave. "As a last resort, in rare cases…
we clone."
"Clone?"
He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped the lens of the eyeglass. "We refer to it as
A Fresh Start
."
The horror must have shown on my face.
He slapped my midsection with his tentacle. "I am jesting. Just jesting." He chuckled.
I wagged my finger at him.
We continued our tour of the facility.
I viewed the next inmate.
"Compulsive gambler," Dr. Boateh said over my shoulder.
"Tough illness."
"Yes. He just can't stop playing the physicists."
I shook my head. "Poor thing. I can relate. Getting caught up in the excitement of the race; the pounding near the finish line when you're praying that your bet has that one last conjecture in him to take him across… "
I realized the good Doctor was giving me a strange look.
"Perhaps we can discuss this, hmmm?" His tentacle reached for me. I jumped back.
But then he laughed.
And I laughed too. Even louder.
We continued on with our tour of the inmates, but I did not have to even look into the next chamber as this unfortunate patient's malady was only too obvious by the sounds emitting from the room.
"What race, Doctor?"
"A Tumovatz from Vatz, " the Doctor replied.
"I hadn't realized the syndrome had spread so far."
"A puzzling phenomenon and we have your home world to thank for it. We see more and more of these disturbing cases every season."
"Do they know who are anymore?"
"I don't believe so. In their minds they have actually become what you see here."
It was pitiful. I had heard enough.
"Shall we move on, Doctor?"
Boateh readily agreed.
As we left the area, the soft, sibilant a cappella strains of
Love Me Tender
followed us down the corridor.
It would haunt me for years.
15
And so the day went. Each case that Boateh revealed was more interesting and disturbing than the one before.
We became more than "
a
journalist" and "the subject" during that tour. The beginnings of a lasting friendship formed; so when we arrived at the room of the last patient of the day, I could tell that this one was rather special to the good doctor.
His formerly upright posture started to slump.
"You see, this is a very rare case. Never heard of another like it."
"What's wrong?"
"Well, he is manic-depressive—but that is not what is so unusual. From what we can determine the disease is present in almost every species. Usually in multiples of two, like quattro bipolarism in Kneph's…"
"I had no idea."
"Oh yes. We all have our ups and downs." His three eyes twinkled at me, but I could tell he was very concerned about his patient.
"So what's so unusual about this particular case?"
"Well, this Tranite shifts to both sides simultaneously."
"You mean he—"
"Flutters and tweets."
"Wait a moment, Doctor! I thought Tranites were hermaphroditic?"
"No, no, no!" The undulating of his aural appendages indicated that he was wincing. "This has nothing to do with that. Look, Tranites either flutter or they tweet. They do
not
do both."
"I don't follow you."
"In Tranite society, there are two classes. One class is constantly without funds. They are the flutterers. The other class always have a stash. They are tweeters. "
"I'm with you so far."