Session ID: 666-894-V
Attending Clinician: Dr. Belialzabeth, Ph.D. in Post-Mortal Psychology Patient: Jasper Vane, 400-year-old Nosferatu-strain Presenting Complaint: Acute Campfire Phobia, Substance-Induced Psychosis
Dr. Belialzabeth: Let us begin by regulating your nervous system, Jasper. I am observing severe psychomotor agitation. Name three objects in the room, and state the current century.
Jasper Vane: (Compulsively shredding a tissue with elongated, translucent phalanges) The obsidian clock. The blood-bank cooler. Your clipboard. It is the twenty-first century. I am indoors. I am safe from the light.
Dr. Belialzabeth: Excellent. Your physical vessel is secure. Now, I want to revisit the precipitating event. You described an acute panic response during a foraging excursion in the Ozarks. Walk me through the sensory sequence.
Jasper Vane: I isolated a target away from the main camp. He smelled of unwashed denim and patchouli. I initiated the feed. But within seconds of tapping his carotid, my peripheral vision dissolved into visual snow. My auditory processing warped. The crickets sounded like screaming sirens.
Dr. Belialzabeth: A rapid onset of substance-induced psychosis. The intake toxicology confirmed your prey was heavily intoxicated with street fentanyl. Your ancient physiology has absolutely no metabolic defense against modern synthetic opioids. What happened next?
Jasper Vane: I lost all spatial awareness. I broke through the tree line and stumbled back toward their campsite. They had a small fire going. But, Doctor… my brain didn’t process burning wood. The light hit my retinas, and the narcotics convinced my nervous system it was the Sun. The actual, blazing, apocalyptic Sun, sitting right there on a ring of river rocks.
Dr. Belialzabeth: The terror of true daylight is the most primal evolutionary fear embedded in your amygdala, Jasper. The synthetic toxins completely hijacked that survival mechanism. Your reaction was subjectively terrifying, but neurologically, it was entirely predictable.
Jasper Vane: (Trembling violently) I threw myself under a parked Subaru Outback! I was shrieking about ultraviolet radiation while the humans pelted me with empty aluminum cans. Now, the mere scent of woodsmoke induces a full panic attack. I haven’t hunted in weeks. I’m sustaining entirely on bagged synthetic plasma.
Dr. Belialzabeth: What we are dealing with is a severe classical conditioning response. The fentanyl created a faulty, traumatic neural bridge between a harmless campfire and the lethal threat of solar radiation.
Jasper Vane: Can it be fixed? I am four hundred years old, Doctor. I survived the Inquisition, but I cannot survive camping season.
Dr. Belialzabeth: We will dismantle that bridge through systematic desensitization. Next week, we start with a single, unlit match in a controlled environment. For now, I am writing a strict prescription for abstinence from any prey attending outdoor music festivals. We stick exclusively to sober demographics until your neurochemistry stabilizes.