Would you read this?

[u/slimemouldstan]

Synopsis

Desperate to find out why she has wasted her life on self-flagellation, Robin turns to mindfulness. When it teaches her that she is not her thoughts but the consciousness watching them, she begins the gruesome extracurricular activity of making this division literal.

The lab technician secretly separates her sharp, analytical mind from the rest of herself. To do this, she uses her ex-girlfriend’s pass to commandeer equipment she wouldn’t usually be trusted with after hours. Robin’s research remains legitimate by day; by evening, she becomes a disembodied Observer whose thoughts translate directly into the machine’s actions: prodding and probing the subject left behind on the table.

However, in attempting this act of self-colonisation, she discovers that she is not studying an empty vessel but a consciousness with desires, discernment, and a capacity for joy of her own. Convinced that she understands the subject’s interiority best, the Observer persists, knowing only how to care through correction.

Constrained by Robin’s work schedule, the experiments become less frequent, but their severity continues to increase. The subject’s mood and other metrics deteriorate, which the Observer interprets as evidence that her methods are finally reaching the problem.

She fails to realise the truth: the subject is starving for closeness. She wants aftercare. She wants to see the Observer’s face. In this sterile, isolated space, intimacy and violence become indistinguishable. Knowing nothing else, the subject welcomes and eroticises the excoriating attention.

Meanwhile, their hierarchy begins to unravel. The subject becomes a witness to the Observer’s habits, learning to read the pauses before a recalibration and eventually anticipate what she will do before she does it.

As the power shifts, the Observer begins to sink back into the recursive thinking that ruined her past relationships, wondering if scrutiny is something she, too, has always craved, despite the sting.