Chapter Eight
Three months after the first attempt, I tried again. It was obvious that I needed to change tact for my next subject. I needed a way to free them without harming them. I allowed myself more preparation during this period. I ventured back to the palace, browsed through the reference books and found a book about conditioning. Through this, I discovered that I could re-engineer the conditioning that had already taken place. It was unnecessary to take out the BCM. I also ripped up part of my blanket and made a rope that I tied into a loop to use for restraining my target.
Now, in the same scenario as months ago; marching through the corridor and back to our rooms, I was much more effective. As I reached my door, I turned around, dropped the rope over the one behind me, tightened, pulled it into my room and shut the door. It was over in seconds. It didn’t have a chance. It began struggling of course, but being restrained by the rope meant it couldn’t escape. I tied it to a bedpost, tightened the knots and waited. It fell asleep some time past nine and as soon as it did, I shook it wide awake. I had read an explanation that said sleep deprivation might help with conditioning. And so, I was trying to keep it awake for as long as possible to make my job easier tomorrow. As soon as it fell asleep, which it did quite often, I would be at it in an instant, shaking and slapping it into wakefulness. This process repeated until very late into the night, when I myself had become too tired to continue.
In the book, it was explained that the type of conditioning everyone was subject to was called operant conditioning, a process in which behaviours were either rewarded or punished in order to strengthen or weaken them. I remembered this process being applied to myself quite vividly. I was young, maybe four or five years old, and instead of the normal classes one day I was led on a march to the other side of the commune and into a building that I had never been to before. Inside, they took me down a corridor and into small, dim room, occupied by only a single chair. They sat me down and then they left, shutting the door behind them, leaving me alone. I stayed in the chair for some time, slightly confused. Looking around, I saw a drain under my chair, and two ominous looking tubes hanging from the ceiling. When I finally decided to get up, huge jets of water attacked me from the tubes, forcing me onto the ground. I struggled toward the door but the water held me back and pushed into my every crevice. I couldn’t see, I couldn’t breathe and the only thing I could hear was the sound of the gushing water that kept me pinned on the ground. Then, after the longest time, I felt a spasm, my mouth opened against my will, and a gulp of heavy water dragged down into me and burned me from the inside. The water stopped, and people came in. They thrust the water out of me, and sat me back on the chair; coughing, wet, weak. Then they left again. I learnt very quickly to stay in the chair, but they left me alone in that room for what seemed like an eternity, on my own and still very scared. Every day for the next few weeks, I was taken to that same building and left in a variety of rooms that I now know was meant for further conditioning. I avoided any pain by following what I assumed I was meant to do. But that first experience was so tortuous it etched itself firmly into my memory; maybe it was the beginning of my discontent. I resolved to be more humane in my own attempts at conditioning.
I had earlier decided that my first course of action would be to decondition its predilection to escape back to its own room. For these purposes, I had made a whip, a weapon discussed in the book as an ideal tool for conditioning. I had ripped the clothes of my previous subject and twined it into rope, then attached a spring that I had dug out of my mattress to the end of it. I had then tested it lightly on myself, and the resulting sting confirmed to me that it would be adequately painful.
I began the next morning. My subject was still asleep, and I woke it up while I was removing its shirt. It tried to stop me once it was awake, but pacified as it were by its bounds, its furious shaking only made my task slightly more tedious. With its shirt off, I began now to loosen its bounds, edging my fingernails under the tight knots. I had left my whip on the ground right next to me. As soon as the bounds were loose enough, it leapt up, making a break for the door. My hand went down and in a single motion I grabbed the whip and swung it hard into its back. It reeled in pain, and I pushed it to the ground, grabbing my pillow and holding it over its face to starve it of oxygen. I wanted it to associate escape with immense discomfort. I let go after a minute or so. It was still very much awake and tried to escape as it did before. I whipped it again, put my pillow over its face again, let it run again. It would not let up, and the game continued until I myself was too tired. I tied it back up, rested, started again. If it wasn’t giving up I wasn’t either. However, I didn’t seem to be making much progress. Its initial conditioning must have been deeper than I thought. By lunchtime I had prevented its escape forty-two times. There were thin lines of red across its back and even though I had read that whips could not do much physical damage, I didn’t want a repeat of the previous disaster, so for a few hours I stopped, and made sure it wasn’t too badly hurt. In the midst of these humanitarian feelings I also saved most of my food from dinner. When I brought it up, I could sense a change in its mood, as it eyed what I held in my hand. It was famished. But I stopped short of giving it what it wanted. I realised that its desire for this food could be another avenue for its deconditioning. I picked up my whip and untied it again, making sure to keep myself between it and the food. Would it attempt to escape as it had dozens of times before, or had it learned? Would I have to stop it again? I could see that it was hesitant; where previously it would furiously rush toward the exit door, it was now still, its head turning to the door, then to me, then to the food, at which it paused. For minutes, we stayed in our respective positions. It, staring down the bowl; me, weapon at the ready.
It wasn’t going to escape.
I picked up the bowl and slowly approached it. It stayed motionless until I reached it. Even as I handed the bowl to it, it did not respond. It just kept staring. Eventually, I poured the gloop down its throat myself. The food spilled into sloppily, before it adjusted its mouth and properly swallowed it. The bowl was emptied and it sat down again. After that I didn’t tie it up anymore, and it didn’t escape. We just sat there, residing awkwardly next to each other, me on the bed, it on the ground. It was still hungry; I was unsure of what to do next. I was happy with the victory I had achieved over its desire to go back to its room, but it was a hollow victory. I wanted to decondition the relentless control over my subject and return free-thinking and independent agency. Instead, it remained as robotic and restricted as ever. Anyhow, at least I knew that the method worked in some way, and it had proved useful. My subject would now stay in my room, and I would be free to experiment.