The Memory Institute

By Clement Masloff

ENON GAREB enters the Memory Institute as an apprentice and assigned as assistant to Dr. Reia Terah. He helps her in combining hypnotic and neurofeedback therapy, but himself suffers from loss of most childhood memories. Reia is fired when her enemy, Dr. Azot Luban, an ally of a pharma tycoon, uncovers her secret experiments with patients and En

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Mulberry Books
• Release date: Nov 21, 2019
• ISBN: 9781951742089

Clement Masloff

The author has been involved with science fiction and speculative literature since teaching himself to read in 1941-1942. He served in the Army as a linguist and translator in four Balkan Slavic languages. For several decades, he taught sociology in Ohio after graduating research in Russian social history. In his retirement years, he has been writing science fiction, a return to dreams of the early 1940s.

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Part I

I.

Zaxia is a country where the past remains a valued and revered element of life into the present, said Enon Gareb to himself as he hurried down the boulevard.

He smiled, realizing that the past had always been a shadow falling over his own life from his earliest memories of it.

Enon was today a candidate for a research position at the Memory Institute of research and treatment here in Zaxia City. He was on his way to an appointment with the organization’s General Chief, Dr. Ithai Adeb. Would he pass this initial examination and be accepted as a therapeutic apprentice?

I have for a considerable time been firmly determined to make myself a participant in the field that this institution concentrates on, he understood.

I am fascinated with the subject of human memory because of my own family experience in terms of my own early childhood.

The young aspirant walked past a dark red brick medical office building and entered the yellowish stone structure holding the destination that held all his personal hopes, the home of the Memory Institute.

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A secretary in a business-suit led the virile, athletic-looking candidate for employment into the office of Chief Ithai Adeb, then left the two men alone in the large room full of magnesium-steel furniture and wall decorations.

Enon smiled at the chunky manager of the institution, a middle-aged man with raven eyes and thinning golden hair. Please, be seated, suggested the Chief.

The person who held the young man’s future in his hands stared at the applicant’s caramel-colored eyes and short chestnut hair.

Tell me why you wish to work here at the Memory Institute, Mr. Gareb, began the official head of the organization. I am always interested in the reasons why different individuals apply for any openings that we happen to come up with over time.

Dr. Adeb attempted as warm a smile as he thought was appropriate with a candidate for employment under him.

Enon recited a reply he had had the foresight to prepare for exactly such an inquiry.

"Of the many areas of human mental activity, none has ever interested me as much as that of the memory. How remembrance occurs in the physical brain and the psychological mind became my central focus at Zaxia University, and I made it my particular focus of attention and study.

"The problems and difficulties that can arise within the operations of personal memories is where I wish to devote my time and energy, sir. That is an area that has fascinated and entranced me for a long time.

"It was my sad fate to lose both my parents in a terrible road-car accident when I was only at the age of eight. My aunt and uncle took me into their home and raised me, helping me to finish secondary school and go on to the university here in the capital. The loss of my mother and father has been the great tragedy that I went through in childhood.

"My major became psychology and my personal interest came to center on the subject of the memory processes within the human brain and mind. I was drawn to the problems of remembering by many factors in my own experience and life history.

That is the story of what has brought me here today, sir.

The Chief waited several seconds before he spoke.

"That is very laudable, because I myself came into this particular field due to similar interest and enthusiasm for finding answers to complicated questions and riddles about human remembrance of what is past and gone.

Your academic record is most impressive, I would even say it was excellent in a number of respects. It appears that you have for a long period been oriented and drawn to what we try to accomplish at our Institute.

Yes, I have held such an ambition for a considerable period of time, confessed the candidate for a position.

The Chief thought a short while before making a surprise announcement to Enon.

"You shall be notified by electro-message when the decision has been fully confirmed by our trustees, but I intend to recommend your hiring, my friend. I dare say that you have impressed me as the best qualified person who has applied for this opening. That is the truth, I can tell you.

May I wish you good fortune and success in your endeavors with us, grinned the head of the Memory Institute.

II.

Enon lived in a small apartment in central Zaxia City, close to the university.

It was minutes after the solar dusk that he heard the loud note on his electro-screen sound, signaling that there had been a message for him just received.

Congratulations, you have been hired as research assistant by the Memory Institute. Report tomorrow morning at the seventh hour to Dr. Reia Terah, who shall be acting as your immediate superior and professional instructor.

The welcome news came from the Chief, Dr. Ithai Adeb.

Enon had a short, nervous sleep that night, looking forward to his initial day at the facility he had for a long time dreamed of joining.

He awoke hours before his customary time and prepared for the day’s thrilling events. A ride on a crowded morning street-rail omnibus took him to the building of the Memory Institute. As soon as the new employee entered the front vestibule he heard the voice of one of the secretaries.

You are scheduled to meet with Dr. Terah, said the young woman. Her office is down near the end of the hall on the right side.

She pointed with her hand to the corridor that would take him to where he was expected.

Enon gulped and swallowed, walking toward his first meeting with the stranger who was to hold his future course in her hands. He was determined to do all her could to impress the psychiatrist with his seriousness and dedication to the aims of the institution. He would be assisting her as a therapeutic psychologist.

The new employee rapped on the office door, hearing a high soprano voice telling him to enter.

Reia Terah, a young-looking female of moderate height looked at him with sparkling cinnamon eyes from behind a small aluminum desk.

Enon identified himself and was asked to sit down across from her.

He smiled at the wiry, sylphlike individual who had been assigned to take command of his training and preparation for research work.

We shall be working together, she began. I see from your records at Zachia University that you have taken every single course that deals with human memory. That will help you a lot in developing the skills you will need with us. She suddenly became absent and distracted. There is almost no area of psychological study as complex and undeveloped as that of the memory and how it operates. Our specialty still has great need of discoveries and breakthroughs in order to catch up with the other aspects of the human mind.

Yes, said Enon with spirit. My ambition is to help, however I can, advance our knowledge and capacities involved with problems of memory.

I first learned the methods of hypnotizing persons with failing memory, but then I discovered from experience that there is no single, simple method that succeeds in restoring what has been lost. It was difficult for me to acknowledge that we possessed few answers to the mysteries and riddles connected to the human mental storage abilities. They continue to remain profound mysteries in many respects.

Enon noticed that she gave a deep sigh of regret and resignation.

I completed all the courses available in hypnotic theory and application, he continued. And during my senior year I was involved in a practicum in mesmerics that included active experience in using that method.

Dr. Terah suddenly frowned. The brain seems too complex for anyone to understand or deal with in any adequate, satisfactory fashion. There exist billions of cellular units that process information in it, connected by kilometers of nerve fibers and trillions of synapses. And all of it operates on no more electrical power than it takes to illuminate a light bulb.

It is a wonder how much memory a brain can hold, mused Enon aloud. Yet there are times and cases when the remembering process completely fails and becomes lost.

His supervisor stared at Enon for several moments before she went on to what her plans were for his coming activities working under her.

"I think that it would be useful for you to accompany me for a time when I visit and talk with a new resident patient recently assigned to me.

"The man’s name is Nabot Jor and he suffers horribly from what has been diagnosed as false memories. These appear to have no relation at all to his life or his personal character.

He now occupies a room in our patient dormitory on the second floor. We can go and see Nabot in a little while. It will help you a lot to become familiar with his case and how I am dealing with it.

Reia Terah, wearing a gleaming white medical uniform identifying her rank and position, rose from her chair and started for the door, Enon right behind her.

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Good morning, Nabot, cheerfully chimed the doctor. How are you feeling today? I want to introduce you to my new assistant, his name is Enon Gareb, and you will be seeing him a lot from now on as we work together.

Reia stepped into the front room of the patient’s tiny flat, Enon trailing immediately behind her. The tall, gangly resident came toward the pair visiting him.

Nabot has for a long time suffered severe dismnesia and has never been too certain what are his true memories and what are unreal fancies and fantasies, declared the therapist, looking back at her new subordinate whom she had just met herself the previous day.

The patient, looking directly at the doctor, suddenly let loose a laugh. I am looking ahead to the picnic. It will be held the day after tomorrow, won’t it?

Yes, that’s right, Nabot. Reports are that the weather will be fair for us. She turned her face toward Enon, who had stepped forward and stood beside her. "We will be holding our annual summer picnic outdoors at the municipal park area that Chief Adeb has reserved for our use and enjoyment. It is an affair that both the residents and the staff are looking ahead to. There is always a very good time had by everyone who is present for the festivity.

You will have the opportunity to join with us and get to meet all of the people connected to the Institute while you are there. It is a special occasion for all of us, the highlight of summer for nearly everyone.

She turned back toward Nabot, who now asked her a question.

When can I have another hypnotic session with you, Doctor? I felt a lot better after our last one over a week ago and I feel ready for more such treatment.

Reia smiled at him. We can do it again this afternoon, right after lunch. My assistant will be attending in order to watch and learn, Nabot.

That is fine with me, confessed the patient, gazing directly at Enon.

We will go now and let you rest, his doctor told him, turning to leave with her new assistant following.

Close to this suite, the two found the rooms of a second patient of Reia Terah.

The resident was a chunky, beefy middle-aged man named Ahaz Daman. He impressed Enon as outgoing and friendly. He seemed to be in a pleasant mood.