Once Upon a Black Kraken

  "I’m gonna recommend the helmet," I announce to Susan. "Gonna get the report, I'll leave you watching the video.” I hold back my urge to inform her that I feel the same way as that last night of university when she decided to continue as an accountant for an appliance company, and I ended up in this clinic specialized in making helmets to correct the deformed heads of babies like hers. It breaks my heart that he is not mine. I run out of the room. Ignore the memorized multimedia. “Bands for 23 hours a day,” “growth-based,” “correct brachycephaly." They request a medical PhD for this business; fixing babies' heads is significant, but fitting and trimming helmets is executable after just a week of training. I abandon the toys and colorful walls area, which disguises our work as not a quasi-medieval way of torture. I am swallowed up by the gray and homogeneous office area behind the scenes. Head to the break room, coffee is urgent. The mission fails d...

  — Voy a recomendarle el casco—, anuncio a Susana.— Voy por el reporte, les dejo el video. Contengo la necesidad de informarle que siento lo mismo que aquella última noche de universidad donde ella decidió seguir como contadora para una empresa de electrodomésticos, y yo terminé en esta clínica especializada en hacer cascos para corregir las cabezas deformes de bebés como el suyo. Me destroza el corazón que no sea mío. Huyo del cuarto. Ignoro la memorizada multimedia. “Bandas por 23 horas al día”, “basadas en el crecimiento”, “corrigen la braquicefalia”. Solicitan una especialidad médica para este oficio, arreglar cabezas de bebés es significativo, pero acomodar y rebajar cascos es ejecutable tras una semana de capacitación. Abandono el área de juguetes y paredes coloridas, que proyecta nuestra labor no es tortura cuasi-medieval . Me engulle la gris y homogénea zona de oficinas tras bambalinas. Me dirijo a la sala de descanso, urge un café. Fracasa la misión...

Part 14 | Part 16 After having to let go Dr. Weiss, I spent a couple of nights looking for him, expecting to find him debilitated or something. The last place I attempted to look was on the destroyed, ceiling-less Wing D. All the building was half-rotten, but the floor on this Wing, thanks to nature, was soggy and every step felt like ice melting below you. I avoided it as much as I could, but I had no other place to search. I encountered an office I had never noticed before. Also, I never looked for it. On its door I could read, on almost-gone letters: Dr. Young. As soon as I entered this space, a sensation of sleepiness flooded my body. My limbs and head felt heavier with every step I took inside. The longest yawn I can recall exited my mouth without even asking me for permission. Through my barely open eyelids, heavy as lead, I discerned what looked like a humanoid figure sitting behind the desk in the center of the room. “Sleep!” A dark, far away voice commanded me. **...

  Part 13 | Part 15 I finally rearranged the library and found out a couple of curious facts that I overlooked the first time I inventoried it. The Natives considered this a sacred land because it was a beacon for wealth, and in consequence, greed. Some sort of mystical magnet that attracts treasures, and people to steal them. Bullshit, fucking Bachman Asylum is not even worth the time. Maybe those myths are what brought the expulsion of the Natives out of this place. An old news from a wrinkled and almost unreadable paper, around the 1920s, explains the facility was leased through some conflict of interest. It was taken from the Natives because the government decided to construct an asylum here, and the ones in charge of operating it, the ‘N’ Family, were political relatives from the one in charge of the Health Department at the time. Nepotism, like life itself, finds a way. My investigation into these manners was obstructed when this weird lady appeared in front of me. ...