The Required Mind

All twenty of us were strapped in place to our desks in neat columns of four. The space between each row was about half the length of an outstretched arm. Our faces held the expression one would make before a horrible death with the mouth gaped open and the eyes wide. We were all faced towards a faded picture of a man strapped in place as we were, staring through us with hollow holes where his eyes should've been with a caption underneath reading: The Ordinary Dies. "Welcome to Thought Clinic" said a husky voice through a speaker phone somewhere above us. "Please ignore the static in my voice. There will be some of you that hear me and some that w..ont" the last word broke off entirely. I assumed the last word was wont but maybe it was a trick of some kind. There was no reason to believe that it was safe to assume anything here. The husky voice went on above us. "You are all damaged in one way or another. In a few minutes you will view a video that will help fix you, help put together the pieces that were previously missing. When it is shown pay close attention to the screen in front of you. There will be nurses here in a moment to administer drugs that will make the next few hours as painless as possible. Good luck." The sound of doors being opened and the patter of footsteps so suddenly after the voice sent a shockwave of anxiety through my chest. My nurse was a woman in her mid twenties with dark red hair. She wore white scrubs that had a round yellow sticker on the left breastpocket with a black bold arrow pointing down. "Your arm please." she said. Without even the slightest bit of hesitation I stretched out my right arm on the desk in front of me. "Very good. Now you'll feel a pinch and then another." she said while dabbing the vein opposite of my elbow with alcohol. Within seconds she retrieved a large syringe from somewhere behind her and proceeded to stick the needle far down into my vein. "Ah" I moaned."

"This will make you feel better. Dont you want to feel better? Yes, of course you do." she said answering herself. My already wide eyes widened more when I noticed she had a nervous tick. Her head rolled from one side to the other as she looked for the other syringe somewhere behind her and rolled again as she was administering the last dose with a syringe a lot smaller than the first into my right arm in the same vein she had used before. There were a few speckles of blood that appeared where the first syringe was used, she pressed her lips slightly before pressing a wad of cotton over the bleeding using a bandaid to hold it in place. "There, there, all better." she said before walking away.

In moments a large blank white screen was coming down automatically over the face of the man with the hollow eyes and the room, once complete lit, was now covered in darkness. A projector showed a woman with a shrewd face and a wide mouth talking. she said. "I am the reaction in your eyes, that keeps you tied to the place your in. If you allow me to fall down deep inside you'll close the space between your destiny, you see you'll steal my reflection. You're not too far from the required mind. I am the pick to the locked door. You have to understand that eventually, in due time, the ordinary dies." she paused and faded her whole face was now buried in some shade of blue. "Sit still and drive my words to the back of your head if any of you so much as move a finger, you're mine..." she went on "There are no discoveries we are only made aware of the set unalterable truths of the universe." She went on for miles about how to discover the truths and rid ourselves of lies. She only spoke indirectly, in some circular motion around something that we were supposed to get. For a moment nothing made much sense until I traced back over her words. I fell in and out of myself with the woman with the wide mouth talking on and on about *The Required Mind* every word that left her lips drove a nail far into the back of my head. When the video ended I could feel my face turning back to normal. The light was turned back on in a flash causing us to see blotches of color. After being left alone in the dark for so long our eyes were now sensitive to the light and we blinked at first in an attempt to make the colors fade. "After the inspections you will be free to go." said the husky voice above. We were herded out to some office where we received check-ups and we were then allowed to leave for our barracks.