Method of Madness

by Brad Kelln

  He be­gan clic­king from si­te to si­te. The le­vel of de­ta­il used to desc­ri­be the clan­des­ti­ne mind-cont­rol ex­pe­ri­ments was phe­no­me­nal. He fo­und si­tes desc­ri­bing elect­ro­mag­ne­tic we­apons, mic­ro­wa­ve we­apons, ELF (Extre­mely Low Fre­qu­ency) we­apons, di­rec­ted energy we­apons, aco­us­tic we­apons, ra­dio fre­qu­ency we­apons and so on. Each si­te desc­ri­bed the we­apons in de­ta­il and of­fe­red check­lists of symptoms that might in­di­ca­te you'd be­en tar­ge­ted for "tes­ting":

  Unex­p­la­ined sen­sa­ti­ons of hot or cold

  Chan­ges in one's sen­se of tas­te or smell

  Prob­lems with eye­sight (e.g., blurry vi­si­on)

  Unex­p­la­ined pa­in

  Chro­nic he­adac­hes

  Dif­fi­cul­ti­es in sle­ep (e.g., in­som­nia or hyper­som­nia)

  Vi­vid nig­h­t­ma­res

  Me­mory prob­lems

  Con­cen­t­ra­ti­on prob­lems

  Ra­pidly shif­ting emo­ti­ons or chan­ges in emo­ti­onal re­ac­ti­ons The symptoms we­re so va­gue and com­mon that sus­cep­tib­le, pa­ra­no­id in­di- vi­du­als wo­uld easily conc­lu­de that they had be­en vic­ti­mi­zed.

  As he re­ad furt­her it was cle­ar that many of the si­tes qu­oted le­gi­ti­ma­te sci­en­ti­fic re­se­arch in are­as li­ke ne­urophy­si­ology, ne­uroc­he­mistry and ba­sic cel­lu­lar pro­ces­ses. Many si­tes pro­po­sed a si­mi­lar and pla­usib­le met­hod of exac­ting chan­ges in a per­son's bra­in: cel­lu­lar ex­ci­ta­ti­on. As a psycho­lo­gist, Dr. Cla­ric knew that pe­op­le's bra­ins ope­ra­te on elect­ri­cal pul­ses. When we see so­met­hing, he­ar so­met­hing or cons­ci­o­usly do so­met­hing, the­re are se­ri­es of elect­ri­cal pul­ses oc­cur­ring thro­ugh ne­urons and synap­ses in the mind. So­me of the Web si­tes pro­po­sed that an in­di­vi­du­al's mind co­uld be af­fec­ted by a mac­hi­ne that in­ter­fe­red with the nor­mal elect­ri­cal func­ti­oning of the bra­in. Dr. Cla­ric was so­mew­hat surp­ri­sed at how be­li­evab­le the the­ori­es we­re:

  The hu­man ner­vo­us system works on elect­ri­cal pul­ses.

  The way pe­op­le think, the com­mands the mind sends for the body to act, is do­ne thro­ugh elect­ri­cal fre­qu­en­ci­es. In es­sen­ce, the hu­man body re­gu­la­tes it­self and ge­ne­ra­tes tho­ught thro­ugh spe­ci­fic bi­olo­gi­cal fre­qu­en­ci­es. To avo­id cel­lu­lar con­fu­si­on with the co­unt­less pul­ses that oc­cur every se­cond, the­re are bi­olo­gi­cal pro­ces­ses to scre­en out bi­olo­gi­cal and ar­ti­fi­ci­al pul­ses that aren't ge­ne­ra­ted for the pur­po­se of com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on with cell gro­ups. Such scre­ening pro­ces­ses inc­lu­de spe­ci­fic so­di­um and po­tas­si­um ions that sup­press fre­qu­en­ci­es-usu­al­ly hig­her-ran­ge fre­qu­en­ci­es-and pre­vent the cells from be­ing over- whel­med. Sig­nals that are re­cog­ni­zed as me­aning­ful are usu­al­ly trans­mit­ted at much lo­wer fre­qu­en­ci­es that pass thro­ugh the scre­ening systems. If a we­apon co­uld be de­ve­lo­ped with a re­so­nan­ce that matc­hed the­se "me­an- ing­ful" bi­olo­gi­cal fre­qu­en­ci­es, it co­uld dis­rupt nor­mal cel­lu­lar pro­ces­ses and ha­ve a wi­de ran­ge of ef­fects on the tar­get. This is the prin­cip­le be­hind Ext­re­mely Low Fre­qu­ency we­apons-dis­rup­ti­on of cel­lu­lar com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on. At low in­ten­sity, such a we­apon co­uld ca­use men­tal con­fu­si­on, whi­le at hig­her in­ten­sity, it co­uld ca­use such sig­ni­fi­cant cel­lu­lar dis­rup­ti­on that a per­son might ex­pe­ri­en­ce a ce­reb­ral em­bo­lism.

  In ad­di­ti­on to ac­cu­ra­te sci­en­ti­fic facts, many of the si­tes re­por­ted re­se­arch by the sa­me aut­hors. This con­sis­tency al­so ga­ve the Web si­tes cre­di­bi­lity. Dr. Cla­ric fo­und study af­ter study by re­now­ned sci­en­tists and re­se­arc­hers li­ke Jose Vi­te­ro, Ray­mond Frey and Isa­ac Pa­pe. So­me of the aut­hors of the re­se­arch wor­ked out of pres­ti­gi­o­us uni­ver­si­ti­es. If.this is a scam or a bo­gus cons­pi­racy the­ory, Dr. Cla­ric tho­ught, then it's a damn ela­bo­ra­te one. He clic­ked anot­her link and be­gan re­ading an ar­tic­le pre­pa­red by a physi­cist at Stan­ford. He'd just star­ted re­ading when anot­her e-ma­il no­ti­fi­ca­ti­on win­dow pop­ped up.

  "Oh shit," he sa­id and lo­oked at his watch. It was ten mi­nu­tes af­ter three and he was la­te for the me­eting. He fi­gu­red so­me­one was e-ma­iling to scold him.

  Dr. Cla­ric,

  The­re's not­hing to find.

  Thank You.

  - A Con­cer­ned Col­le­ague

  Dr. Cla­ric didn't know what to ma­ke of it. The­re was no reply e-ma­il ad­dress. He clic­ked on "pro­per­ti­es" to bring up ad­di­ti­onal in­for­ma­ti­on on the e-ma­il. Apart from the da­te and ti­me stamp, the­re was not­hing. He clic­ked back to the e-ma­il.

  "What the hell?" he whis­pe­red to him­self.

  He rol­led his cur­sor over the "print" but­ton, tap­ping the mo­use on­ce. He de­ci­ded he wan­ted a hard copy of this to show to a few pe­op­le. The scre­en fro­ze.

  "Damn it. Not now."

  He pres­sed the com­pu­ter's re­set but­ton. The scre­en went blank and the com­pu­ter whir­red as it re­bo­oted.

  As so­on as he was back in the system, he went stra­ight to his e-ma­ils lo­oking for the myste­ri­o­us mes­sa­ge, but it was go­ne. Dr. Gla­ric jum­ped up from his desk and ran down the cor­ri­dor un­til he re­ac­hed a set of do­ors ope­ning in­to a lar­ger ro­om di­vi­ded in­to cu­bic­les. He went stra­ight to the back whe­re the prin­ter sat. He co­uldn't find a prin­to­ut anyw­he­re.

  He tur­ned to a dark-ha­ired wo­man at a com­pu­ter a few fe­et away. "Gladys, did anyt­hing print out he­re just a se­cond ago?"

  She didn't even turn aro­und to ans­wer. "No."

  "That's funny. I tri­ed prin­ting a mes­sa­ge and my system fro­ze. When I log­ged back in the mes­sa­ge was go­ne."

  "Did you de­le­te it?" she as­ked, tur­ning to him.

  "No, I was just trying to print it."

  "Don't know what to tell you. That sho­uldn't hap­pen. Our fi­les sho­uld be se­cu­re un­til we de­le­te them. You sho­uldn't be ab­le to just lo­se stuff." She pa­used and then ad­ded, "Was it im­por­tant?"

  Dr. Cla­ric con­si­de­red the qu­es­ti­on. "I gu­ess not."

  EIGHT

  "I was just pa­ged," Mic­ha­el Wen­ton bar­ked in­to the re­ce­iver.

  His Emer­gency Res­pon­se Te­am pa­ger had so­un­ded just af­ter ten in the eve­ning, which me­ant the­re was a bar­ri­ca­ded su­bj­ect or a hos­ta­ge si­tu­ati­on.

  In eit­her ca­se, Wen­ton was the on-call ex­pert for the Ha­li­fax Re­gi­onal

  Po­li­ce's ne­go­ti­ati­on te­am.

  "Dr. Wen­ton. Thank you for cal­ling back so qu­ickly. We ha­ve a si­tu­ati­on in Wo­od­lawn and we'd li­ke you to co­me down right away."

  Wo­od­lawn was an ol­der re­si­den­ti­al ne­igh­bo­ur­ho­od in Dart­mo­uth, right ac­ross the har­bo­ur from Ha­li­fax, but it was still part of the Ha­li­fax Re­gi­onal Mu­ni­ci­pa­lity.

  "I'm at ho­me. Send a car." He hung up the pho­ne wit­ho­ut wa­iting for a res­pon­se. He'd be­en thro­ugh this ro­uti­ne be­fo­re and didn't ne­ed to ha­ve the de­ta­ils exp­la­ined to him.

  Wen­ton tur­ned back to his li­ving ro­om. A lar­ge-scre­en TV to­we­red in one cor­ner, fa­cing an im­po­sing bo­ok­ca­se li­ned with hund­reds of DVD mo­vi­es. He step­ped to­wards his cof­fee tab­le and pic­ked up the re­mo­te. Wit­ho­ut lo­oking at the but­tons, his fin­gers deftly switc­hed off the DVD, te­le­vi­si­on and the sur­ro­und so­und ste­reo. He drop­ped the re­mo­te on the co­uch and went to the bed­ro­om to ret­ri­eve his bul­letp­ro­of vest and po­li­ce jac­ket.
/>   Appro­xi­ma­tely thirty mi­nu­tes af­ter the pa­ge, Wen­ton was se­ated in the com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons van of the Emer­gency Res­pon­se Te­am. Ac­ross from him was Staff Ser­ge­ant Lin­coln Whit­ley, the he­ad ne­go­ti­ator.

  "He­re's the si­tu­ati­on, Doc," Whi­tely be­gan. "The piz­za guy shows up at

  112 Law­son Ave­nue at aro­und 20:20. Turns out he was sup­po­sed to go to

  116 Law­son and fuc­ked up. It's the last fuck-up he'll ma­ke be­ca­use he wa gre­eted at the do­or by our su­bj­ect, Barry Bo­se­man, who shot him at po­int-blank ran­ge with a rif­le. The su­bj­ect has be­en bar­ri­ca­ded in the ho­use ever sin­ce. The only con­tact we've had is lis­te­ning to this guy scre­aming his he­ad off abo­ut di­se­ase."

  "Di­se­ase?" Wen­ton as­ked. "What di­se­ase?"

  "I don't ha­ve a clue. I as­su­me he's fuc­kin' nuts and that's why you're he­re."

  "How's the piz­za guy?"

  "De­ad. We fi­nal­ly ma­na­ged to get a co­up­le of guys to drag the body off the front steps. Mas­si­ve bul­let wo­unds to the chest."

  "Fi­ne. What do you ha­ve on the su­bj­ect?"

  "Forty-fi­ve. Se­pa­ra­ted for abo­ut two months. Re­cent his­tory of men­tal il­lness and psychi­at­ric tre­at­ment. No pre­vi­o­us re­cord."

  Wen­ton frow­ned. "Got a na­me on the psychi­at­ric tre­at­ment?"

  "Dr. Ken­neth Ah­maz­da or so­me fuc­kin' thing. I've got the num­ber he­re." He han­ded an open no­te­bo­ok to Wen­ton and po­in­ted to the num­ber circ­led on the mid­dle of the pa­ge. "We've al­re­ady tri­ed to con­tact him. He's on call at the At­lan­tic Co­ast Hos­pi­tal. That num­ber I ga­ve you is the switch­bo­ard."

  ***

  "Ken? It's Mic­ha­el Wen­ton."

  "Hel­lo Dr. Wen­ton. I gu­ess the­re's so­me se­ri­o­us bu­si­ness go­ing on," Ken Ah­mad­zai sa­id in a thick Mid­dle Eas­tern ac­cent.

  "Ye­ah, you wan­na gi­ve me the run-down on a for­mer pa­ti­ent?"

  "That wo­uld be bre­aking con­fi­den­ti­ality."

  "He kil­led a guy al­re­ady. He's eit­her go­ing to kill mo­re pe­op­le or him- self. Get over it and tell me why Barry Bo­se­man was in the hos­pi­tal."

  "Fi­ne. Fi­ne. Mr. Bo­se­man was he­re for a bre­ak­down af­ter his wi­fe and son left him. Mr. Bo­se­man had be­en un­fa­ith­ful."

  "Unfa­ith­ful how?" Wen­ton as­ked.

  "I gu­ess Mr. Bo­se­man had an af­fa­ir. He che­ated on his wi­fe but did not tell her."

  "Which is sort of the ba­sic de­fi­ni­ti­on of che­ating?" Wen­ton mumb­led sar­cas­ti­cal­ly.

  "What? Oh. Yes. Any­way, Mr. Bo­se­man was un­for­tu­na­te and cont­rac­ted an STD.'He in­fec­ted his wi­fe with her­pes. Ne­ed­less to say, his mar­ri­age suf­fe­red. When his wi­fe left, he co­uld not hand­le it and en­ded up he­re."

  "Di­ag­no­sis?"

  "Adj­ust­ment di­sor­der. Pos­sib­le mo­od di­sor­der with psycho­tic fe­atu­res."

  "Su­ici­dal?"

  "Very. He was un­der 'clo­se' the en­ti­re ti­me he­re."

  "Meds?"

  "Flu­oxe­ti­ne, but he left AMA and I do not think he was ta­king the meds."

  "Anything el­se, Ken?"

  "If Mr. Bo­se­man kil­led so­me­one it pro­bably me­ans he has be­co­me com- ple­tely psycho­tic. He will qu­ite li­kely re­ma­in dan­ge­ro­us to him­self and ot­hers."

  ***

  "He's co­me to the do­or a few ti­mes. He's still wa­ving that rif­le aro­und and scre­aming." Staff Ser­ge­ant Whit­ley was fil­ling Wen­ton in as he step­ped back in­to the com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons van. "What'd you get from the shrink?"

  "Tro­ub­le. Barry Bo­se­man is su­ici­dal. His wi­fe re­cently left him and to­ok the­ir in­fant son. I think we might be get­ting in­to a su­ici­de-by-cop si­tu­ati­on."

  "That wo­uld exp­la­in his be­ha­vi­o­ur. He ke­eps wal­king out on­to the porch and po­in­ting that rif­le. He's da­ring us to ta­ke a shot at him."

  "Why ha­ven't you?" Wen­ton as­ked ca­su­al­ly.

  Whit­ley wasn't surp­ri­sed at the qu­es­ti­on. He knew he wasn't de­aling with a typi­cal psycho­lo­gist. "We've got the area se­cu­re. My men aren't in any im­me­di­ate dan­ger from the guy. He hasn't fi­red any shots at us, just wa­ved the gun aro­und. But if this guy de­ci­des to do so­met­hing re­al stu­pid, li­ke ta­king a run at us…" He ma­de his hand in­to a gun and mo­ut­hed the word "bang."

  Wen­ton nod­ded. "The si­tu­ati­on on this guy is that he che­ated on the wi­fe, got her­pes and bro­ught it ho­me. When the wi­fe fo­und out she had an STD she pro­bably fre­aked out. He con­fes­sed to the af­fa­ir and she left him, ta­king the baby. He to­ok it pretty hard. I think he wants to die but do­esn't ha­ve the balls to do it him­self."

  "So he kil­led the piz­za guy?"

  "I don't know. I don't think so. You sa­id the piz­za guy went to the wrong ho­use, right? I bet Bo­se­man was just start­led or so­met­hing. It do­esn't ma­ke any sen­se to just kill the piz­za guy out of the blue."

  Whit­ley nod­ded.

  "Let's get this guy on the pho­ne," Wen­ton an­no­un­ced. "I think I know how to end this thing."

  ***

  "JUST PICK UP THE PHO­NE, MR. BO­SE­MAN!" Whit­ley tur­ned to fa­ce Wen­ton and the si­te com­man­der, Dil­lon Mo­ore, co­ve­ring his hand­set as he sa­id, "It's 'Bo­se­man,' right?"

  Wen­ton and Mo­ore both nod­ded.

  Whit­ley tur­ned back to his hand­set. "MR. BO­SE­MAN, THIS IS STAFF SER­GE­ANT LIN­COLN WHIT­LEY OF THE HA­LI­FAX RE­GI­ONAL PO­LI­CE. GO TO THE FRONT DO­OR, GET THE CEL­LPHO­NE. DO IT NOW!"

  They watc­hed the front do­or for any sign of mo­ti­on. The po­li­ce had ma­na­ged to get a cel­lpho­ne on­to the front steps whe­re Barry Bo­se­man co­uld easily ret­ri­eve it if he de­ci­ded to talk.

  "How's that, Doc?" Whit­ley as­ked wit­ho­ut shif­ting his ga­ze from the front do­or.

  "Fi­ne."

  "What's fi­ne?" Mo­ore as­ked.

  Whit­ley glan­ced at him and then back to the ho­use. "Wen­ton thinks that this guy might res­pond to aut­ho­rity. He fi­gu­res I sho­uld iden­tify myself as an of­fi­cer when I hold on! He­re he co­mes!"

  They watc­hed Barry Bo­se­man ap­pe­ar be­hind the scre­en do­or on his front step. He lo­oked one way then the ot­her be­fo­re sho­ving the do­or open. Wit­ho­ut he­si­ta­ti­on, he wal­ked out on the steps, rif­le in one hand, sto­oped, grab­bed the pho­ne and ret­re­ated back in­to the ho­use.

  "Ni­ce call doc­tor," Mo­ore nod­ded.

  "Pro­bably had mo­re to do with the stan­doff drag­ging on," Wen­ton sa­id blankly.

  "All right!" Whit­ley yel­led as he step­ped back in­to the com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons van. "I want ever­yo­ne in he­re to shut the fuck up. I'm cal­ling the su­bj­ect." He sat at a small, cram­ped tab­le and pic­ked up a comp­li­ca­ted lo­oking re­ce­iver. He scan­ned a list of pre-prog­ram­med num­bers on a lar­ge nu­me­ric pad and then lo­oked up. "Pho­ne com­pany sa­id which fuc­kin' one of the­se is the num­ber?"

  An of­fi­cer stan­ding ne­arby qu­ickly mo­ved to the tab­le and po­in­ted to the se­cond pre­set.

  Whit­ley nod­ded and pres­sed the but­ton. Wen­ton and Mo­ore sto­od ne­ar-by, both we­aring cord­less he­ad­sets to mo­ni­tor the con­ver­sa­ti­on.

  "One ring," Whit­ley an­no­un­ced.

  They wa­ited.

  "Two rings."

  Not­hing.

  "Three rings."

  "Co­me on, buddy," Mo­ore ur­ged.

  "Fo­ur rings."

  And then Barry Bo­se­man ans­we­red: "Hel­lo?"

  "Barry, this is Staff Ser­ge­ant Lin­coln Whit­ley of the Ha­li­fax Re­gi­onal

&nbs
p; Po­li­ce. I'd li­ke to talk to you for a mi­nu­te."

  "I don't want to talk. I just want to be de­ad," the man sa­id in a bro­ken vo­ice.

  "We don't want an­yo­ne get­ting hurt he­re, inc­lu­ding you, Barry. We just ne­ed to work this thing out and get you out of the­re sa­fely. Okay, Barry?"

  Wen­ton re­cog­ni­zed the im­pact of pre­vi­o­us tra­ining he'd do­ne with the po­li­ce. Whit­ley's re­pe­ated use of the su­bj­ect's na­me was an at­tempt to es­tab­lish a clo­ser, os­ten­sibly mo­re in­ti­ma­te re­la­ti­ons­hip.

  "You just want to throw me in ja­il."

  "You don't want to be in the­re any­mo­re, do you, Barry? Isn't it ti­me to stop this, put the rif­le down and co­me out?"

  "DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!"

  "I'm sorry. I just want to get us out of this pe­ace­ful­ly, just li­ke you want. Right, Barry?"

  "I want to talk to my wi­fe."

  "I'll see what we can do abo­ut that. In the me­an­ti­me, why don't you put the gun down and co­me on out." Re­pe­ating the sa­me inst­ruc­ti­ons over and over was anot­her com­mon tech­ni­que of the ne­go­ti­ator.

  "STOP TAL­KING! YOU'RE DIST­RAC­TING ME."

  Whit­ley shot a qu­ick lo­ok to Wen­ton who nod­ded, but Whit­ley frow­ned and sho­ok his he­ad. He wasn't com­for­tab­le with Wen­ton's ear­li­er sug­ges- ti­on for get­ting Bo­se­man out.