Woman on the Edge of Time

Alice did keep going. She succeeded in heaving herself out of the bed and it took both attendants and the nurse to force her flat again. As the struggle proceeded, the crew started filming, a mike dangling over the bed, while the impassive gum-chewing cameraman edged Patty out of the way to get a good angle.

“Welcome to the monkey house at the zoo!” Sybil yelled. All the patients were active now, some talking loudly to themselves or the air, Miss Green lying prone with the pillow pushed over her head, Tina Ortiz watching in a knot of fury. The men were crowding the door to stare in. Alvin made a dash down the ward to bang on the outer door with both fists. Fats grabbed him under the armpits and walked him back to his bed. Alvin did not appear again; probably they snowed him with heavy tranks.

Redding, wearing a small mike around his neck like a pendant, lectured steadily on amperage and voltage. “We will be stimulating points one through ten of the left amygdala with point nine milliamps, one hundred, point two microseconds pulse duration, bidirectional square waves for five seconds.” He sounded like a repairman from the telephone company calling in to report on a job. Alice breathed in snorts, letting go a tirade of curses. One of the crew shut off her mike. The two attendants braced themselves, holding her down. Dr. Argent stood with his hands clasped behind his back and his lips pursed as if he might start whistling a tune, watching the whole scene with bright interested gaze. Occasionally he rocked to and fro on the balls of his feet. Dr. Hodges stood farther back, stealing a glance at his watch. Finally he sent Patty for a chair.

“The focal brain dysfunction we see in this patient has resulted in episodic dyscontrol. We believe this kind of hardcore senseless aggression can be controlled—even cured. In layman’s language, something is wrong in the electrical circuitry—some wires are crossed in the switchboard of the amygdala. When these circuits ‘short out,’ as it were, irrational violence is triggered in the patient.”

Dr. Argent winced, seemed as if he would speak, muttered to himself. Finally he said softly, “Perhaps we should leave analogies to the poets, Charlie.”

“Acker, ready? Morgan? Moynihan? Let’s go.” Redding turned to the camera crew. “You can film the computer stuff at the institute. Here we’re just jerry-rigged.”

“In the city, gentlemen,” Miss Moynihan said to the crew, “we can show you the complete procedures. We have the best equipment.”

“Listen, there aren’t many state hospitals in the country where you could get this far,” Dr. Hodges said testily.

“Chip, come on in the picture,” Redding pleaded, and together they moved toward the bedside. “Turn on her mike. Alice, how are you feeling today?”

“Motherfucker, you let me up! I ain’t no guinea pig!”

“Can you bleep some of that out? Okay.” He signaled, like a conductor to his orchestra. “Alice, now how do you feel?”

Alice relaxed suddenly. A look of surprise came over her face. She didn’t reply. Her mouth remained open, then she shut it.

“Release her,” Redding said to the attendants.

They looked uncomfortable and did not let go. Fats whined, “Doctor, she strikes out fast, like a rattlesnake. She can take you by surprise.”

“O ye of little faith,” Redding said with a faint smile. “Let her go. Stand back.”

Gingerly the two attendants backed away from Alice. She continued to lie still.

“Now how are you feeling, Alice?”

Alice turned her head from side to side. She began to smile. “I feel good. I feel so good.”

“Tell us what you’re experiencing, Alice.”

“I like you, baby. Come here. Come close to Alice. That feel so good. You good to me now.”

Redding chuckled. “See? Like taking candy from a baby. Righto. Okay, attendants, hold her down.”

Exchanging looks of confusion, the attendants took hold of Alice, who giggled and writhed.

“I mean hold her. I mean carefully!” Redding barked.

A moment later Alice’s face broke into a snarl and she jerked upright and lashed out at Fats. The nurse had to pile on to wrestle her.

“Now once again let her go.”

“Doctor! We can’t.”

But Alice collapsed and began to giggle.

“You see, we can electrically trigger almost every mood and emotion—the fight-or-flight reaction, euphoria, calm, pleasure, pain, terror! We can monitor and induce reactions through the microminiaturized radio under the skull. We believe through this procedure we can control Alice’s violent attacks and maintain her in a balanced mental state. The radio will be feeding information and telemetry straight into the computer once we’re in the institute, and Alice will be able to walk around the ward freely. That concludes our little preview demonstration.”

The cameraman said, as they began packing up, “That’s pretty impressive, Doc. Can you turn her on and off like that every time?”

“Does the light go on when you press the switch?”

As the video tape crew left, Redding turned to his audience. “Well, Sam, Chip, what do you say? Find that interesting?”