Plague Doctor

In the 1930s, the result of German psychologist Wolfgang Metzger’s experiment showed that when a subject’s sight was filled with everything of the same color and having no differentiating properties, there would be changes to his encephalogram, and he might even suffer from hallucinations. The most common example would be miners who were trapped in darkness from cave ins. After a few days, they would start to hallucinate. Even explorers of the north pole would start seeing things after being exposed to pure whiteness for days. This was called the Ganzfeld Effect.

In 1974, psychologist Charles Honorton released the first experimental report on ESP in the periodical APA. From 1974 to 1982, forty-two ESP experiments were reported.

Inside the quiet lab, Gu Jun was looking at the pictures on the monitor. The first set of pictures was relatively simple. They were four individual things. The result taken from this first round would not be conclusive because the transmitter might choose a dog due to their natural favoritism, and the receiver could choose the same because they knew about the transmitter’s penchant for furry animals. But the second set of pictures was completely different. The four pictures had extremely complicated details. The one in the top left was a picture of a summit with many tourists, the top right was an unkempt room, the lower left was an untidy patch of grassland, and the bottom right was a picture of a rather convoluted underground tunnel.

Gu Jun chose at random. He clicked on the picture of the room and thought in his mind, ‘Wu Siyu, it’s the room, the room…’

The third set of pictures could be described in the same way. They were images of streets in a busy city. There were pedestrians, vehicles, and skyscrapers, and they looked like different views of the same city. Nothing about any of them stood out. There was no billboard or anything. Gu Jun chose the one in the bottom right and started to focus on his transmission. The fourth set of pictures were human faces. Gu Jun recognized none of them.

The fifth set was chaotic and an indescribable combination of lines, shapes, and bright spots; they carried no meaning at all. Since the third set, Gu Jun had felt his brain weakening during transmission. Even his heart was having difficulty. It was a sign of exhaustion of his brain power. When he reached the fifth set, it felt like he was being sucked into a whirlpool, and the lines, shapes, and light spots were twisting around him, like shadows that were coming into being. This caused his head to pulse with pain. Confusing thoughts arose in his heart.

‘An illusion?’

Something relevant about this place and this scenario… was a trigger for his illusions?

“Alright, the thirty seconds is up.” At that moment, one of the lab members came forward to inform Gu Jun, “You can stop now.”

“Okay.” Once Gu Jun’s attention was pulled away from those pictures, and the feeling of an incoming illusion stopped. The lab member immediately helped him remove the devices he was connected to.

Prof Shen walked over to ask, “How do you feel?”

Elder Tong followed behind him.

Gu Jun answered honestly. “Initially, I didn’t feel anything too special, but from the third set onward, it felt like the experiment was draining my brain. At the end, I felt like I was seeing things, but I couldn’t tell clearly what they were.”

At the same time, a lab member walked into the inner room to tell Wu Siyu to stop and help her with the devices. Her pained voice came from within. “This headache, it feels like my brain is splitting… I did see something, but I’m not sure whether it was the white noise or not because I can technically see things at any time…”

‘Splitting headache? Same as mine?’ Gu Jun’s heart skipped. ‘Our senses have connected?’

Elder Tong and Prof Shen shared a look. The excitement was clear in their eyes. Together, they walked into the inner room to check the results. Gu Jun and Wu Siyu were temporarily separated. Gu Jun had to stay outside lest he influenced Wu Siyu. Inside the inner room, with everyone watching, Wu Siyu started to pick out the pictures. For the first set, she chose the apple.

“…” The lab members could not help but frown. She did not match Gu Jun’s choice of the forest. For the second set, Wu Siyu chose the unkempt grassland, not the room. Another miss.

“This can’t be.” Elder Tong hissed desperately. He mumbled to his old partner, “Do you think this girl is toying with us on purpose?”

“Calm down.” Prof Shen pressed his hand on Elder Tong’s shoulder, but he understood why his old partner was so nervous. If they got no results from this, then what happened that year… that case, the old friends they had lost, the dissolution of Phoenix… would forever be lost among the sea of unsolved cases. However, Elder Tong’s expression immediately changed from desperation to surprise and then to affirmative joy. Wu Siyu had selected the correct choice for the third, fourth, and fifth picture sets. Three out of five, sixty percent accuracy.

“How can this be?” Elder Tong asked his partner. According to past history, the accuracy should be higher for the simpler set of pictures, but it was the inverse with Wu Siyu.

“The transmission of simple images might be distorted by her abnormal senses.” Prof Shen gave a hypothesis. “So, it is much easier for her to differentiate between the most complicated images. Or perhaps Gu Jun did not focus enough at the start, and he only became serious later.”

The two of them had no idea what was going on, but their faces were bright with joy. This experiment was effective. Then it was time for them to swap places. Wu Siyu acted as the transmitter and Gu Jun the receiver.

“In a while, your mind might get extremely active. There might be many flying shadows and flashing lights,” Prof Shen told Gu Jun. “Do not resist them, do not think about them, just open your mind to feel them.”

“Kid, listen to me.” Elder Tong was the most serious he had ever been, even more serious then when he was lecturing in the day. He spoke as if he had been through all this before. “What we call chaos is not something that can only be understood after being categorized into common classifications. It is simply what it is. There is no need for you to attempt to understand it. In fact, do not attempt to try to get a clearer understanding. Embrace the chaos. It will guide the way. Just think of it as an art appreciation class on Picasso’s paintings.”

Gu Jun nodded silently. This was probably the most absurd yet reasonable lecture he had gotten from Elder Tong.

Soon, Gu Jun was lying on the couch in the inner room. His eyes were covered by the halves of white ping pong balls. When he asked, they told him they were the common goggles used in this experiment. Then, he put on the headphones, and he could hear the constant static like the noise from a television when there was no signal or like… the sound of the sea. He opened his eyes but could see nothing but the red light coming from the ceiling. It was a swath of dark red everywhere he turned.

“Phew.” Gu Jun took a deep breath as he was led into a strange misty land. Images of blood flashed in his mind. The blood in the surgery room, the blood of the members of the Afterlife Cult…

The more he stared at the redness around him, the more his heart started to quiver. It showed in his increased heart rate. As expected, his mind started to get fuzzy, and images changed before his eyes. Gu Jun was reminded of Elder Tong’s advice; he did not try to focus on anything but evened out his breathing and allowed the lights and shadows to dance around him. But perhaps because of that, some of the images became clearer. However, he was unclear whether these were images transferred over by Wu Siyu or the advent of illusions…

The pain in his brain became sharper, the illusion becoming clearer and more stable. Unlike previous encounters, which were akin to falling into a dream, this time, it was like he was watching the television. He could see some of the broken images clearly.

There was a group of children sitting around, singing, but Gu Jun was not among them. The children were wearing clothes from the eighties or nineties. In different scenes, the children were running about, playing, sleeping… The background was all blurred out.

Suddenly, Gu Jun saw a scene where all the children were seated inside a classroom. This time, the background came into focus. It was an old primary school classroom. An old dusty fan swung lazily, and there were rows of wooden tables and chairs. There were articles pasted on the back of the room. The words on them were blurry; they seemed to be kind wishes for Mother’s Day.

Around thirty children were seated squarely in their seats with their hands placed on the surface of the table. They stared at the podium and blackboard before them, and their faces were devoid of any emotion. Among the static, he seemed to hear someone talking.

It was a familiar voice, a familiar female voice.

“Let him see…” she told the children. It was his mother.

Gu Jun’s sight suddenly moved to the podium. There were five people standing there in masks and black robes. They did not look like the design of the Afterlife Cult. Even though they were well-covered, Gu Jun could recognize one of them easily. It was his mother. She was the one speaking.

On the ground, there was a young man kneeling there. His limbs were trussed up tightly, and his face was bruised from beating. One of his scapulae appeared to be broken, and fresh blood was oozing out of his stomach.

The man’s eyes were covered in the ping pong goggles used in the ESP experiment. Suddenly, his face twisted in pain, and his body started to shake as he screamed crazily. It was a sound similar to the one Lou Xiaoning made when she looked through the keyhole of the red door, like she had seen something from her darkest nightmare.

Gu Jun could recognize this young man as well. It was Elder Tong.