On the endless wilderness, Nish sped along the interstate highway. Finally spotting a charging station in the distance, she arrived only to find it completely deserted—even the charging pillars were covered in dust. It seemed this place had once been lively, but for some unknown reason, it had fallen into neglect. Taking out the solar charger from the trunk, Nish saw it would take over three hours. Looking around, she noticed a museum not far away. Weeds surrounded the walls of the museum, and a sign read "Rollo Haynes' Black Museum." It seemed like a good way to kill some time.
The museum hadn't opened yet, and just as Nish was about to leave, she heard the door open. The person who opened it was the owner and curator—Rollo Haynes himself, as indicated on the sign. Rollo was convinced that many visitors would come today. Nish glanced at the empty road and could only offer a faint smile. As the only guest, Nish received Rollo's personal attention. After a bag check and metal detection, the tour finally began.
Most of the items in the museum were related to criminal cases, each with a bloody and terrifying story behind it. Rollo casually explained the exhibits while wiping sweat from his forehead. The damn air conditioner was broken again. After a few complaints, Rollo led Nish to the main exhibition area. Here were some peculiar exhibits—Rollo's prized possessions, all connected to him personally.
Before opening the museum, Rollo worked as a neurological medical technology researcher at St. Juniper Hospital in New York. The life and death situations in the hospital provided him with many opportunities for experimental projects. The first exhibit he highlighted was the Emotional Diagnostic Device, a headset once used by Dr. Peter Dawson.
Dr. Dawson was ambitious but not very skilled, often failing to accurately diagnose his patients' symptoms. He was deeply troubled by this. Seizing the opportunity after another failed surgery, Rollo recommended this emotional diagnostic device to him. By implanting a receiver in Dawson's cerebellum, whenever a patient wore the headset, Dawson could immersively feel their pain and emotions. This invention indeed greatly improved Dawson's success rate, even allowing him to detect misdiagnoses by other doctors. For a time, he was called a "miracle doctor."
From appendicitis and fractures to terminal cancer, Dawson saved countless lives. However, during an emergency treatment of a poisoned patient, he experienced unprecedented agony—a taste of death. From then on, he became obsessed with this sensation; pain brought him pleasure. The more pain, the more euphoria. He began disregarding patients' lives in pursuit of this high.
Dawson was suspended for a week due to his bizarre behavior. During that week, he stayed at home and began self-harming to chase that feeling. As a doctor, he knew which parts to cut without being fatal. But it was like drug addiction—the craving grew stronger, and the required intensity increased. One late night, Dawson attacked a homeless man, forcing the headset onto him. As he tortured the homeless man, the fear, pain, and death transmitted through the receiver sent him into repeated ecstasy. Eventually, overstimulated, Dawson lost consciousness. He was found and sent to the hospital, becoming a permanent vegetative patient with a satisfied smile still on his face.
After finishing this story, Rollo felt the museum was unbearably hot, his shirt almost soaked with sweat. Nish seemed eager for more and took a bottle of water from her backpack, handing it to him. Rollo drank it in one go and began introducing the next exhibit—a stuffed monkey toy. The story originated from an unfortunate couple. Just when their lives were happiest, the wife, Kelly, was involved in a car accident, leaving her husband, Jack, and their three-year-old child behind as she fell into a vegetative state. For years, Jack visited Kelly every week, talking about their child, but he never managed to wake her. The hospital installed a communication box for testing, using green and red lights to respond simply to surroundings. The experiment was successful: green for yes, red for no. Kelly could communicate with Jack and make simple judgments.
Not satisfied with this, Rollo wanted to advance the research. He proposed an unimaginable surgery to Jack: consciousness transfer. Humans only use 40% of their brains; Rollo could extract Kelly's consciousness and transplant it into Jack's unused brain capacity. This way, Kelly could see, hear, and even feel their child's embrace through Jack's body. Jack could hear Kelly speak and express her thoughts. In exchange, Kelly on the hospital bed would undergo euthanasia and donate her organs. While Jack was still hesitating, the green light on Kelly's bedside lit up.
The transplantation process was safe and painless. After many years, Kelly saw her child again and felt the warmth of embracing him. For a while, it seemed as if the happy family of three had returned. But it didn'tt last long. Like any ordinary family, Jack and Kelly began to disagree on certain matters. To make Jack listen to her, Kelly nagged incessantly. The voice in his mind gradually annoyed and troubled Jack, and sometimes he deliberately opposed her.
When the conflict reached an irreconcilable point, Jack sought out Rollo. Rollo's solution was to install a switch allowing Jack to turn Kelly's consciousness on and off. Kelly passively accepted this arrangement. For the sake of their child, they reached an agreement: Kelly would be turned off on weekdays and activated on weekends. Kelly enjoyed her time with the child on weekends, akin to post-divorce visitation rights. Life seemed back on track—until Jack found a new romantic relationship. Jack's girlfriend couldn't accept another woman in his mind giving orders, and Kelly was equally unwilling to let another woman raise her child.
Jack and his girlfriend went to see Rollo again. Rollo suggested permanently deleting Kelly's consciousness, but Jack, who still had feelings for Kelly, firmly refused. So Rollo offered another solution: transfer Kelly's consciousness into a digital form within the stuffed monkey toy. This way, Jack gained freedom, and Kelly could see her child through the toy's mechanical parts and emit preset phrases like "Monkey loves you" or "Monkey wants a hug" when needed, feeling the child's embrace. This was done without Kelly's knowledge. By the time she realized it, she had become a birthday gift from Jack to their child. How much patience would a nine-year-old have? The stuffed monkey was eventually discarded in a corner, gathering dust and cockroaches. It was because of this incident that Rollo was expelled from the hospital. As Rollo finished speaking, the monkey toy emitted a "Monkey wants a hug," startling Nish. It turned out Kelly was still inside.
The museum was stuffy and hot. Rollo felt extremely unwell but persisted in introducing the main attraction to Nish: the death row inmate kept in the museum. Lifting a blood-red curtain, a glass-walled cell was revealed in one corner of the museum, where a Black man crouched on the bed, dazed. This was Clayton Rae, convicted years ago for the brutal murder of a famous weather presenter. In exchange for substantial financial support for Clayton's family, Rollo obtained his consciousness during the execution by electric chair.
Combining Dawson's sensory technology, Kelly's consciousness transfer technology, and holographic projection, Clayton was imprisoned here, forced to reenact the electric chair execution daily for visitors. Whenever a visitor pressed the button, Clayton's consciousness would experience a massive electric current, his body twisting in agony while emitting piercing screams. This exhibit was once very popular and attracted many tourists. However, after an investigation revealed that the police had tampered with DNA evidence to close the case and that Clayton might not be the real culprit, people lost interest. Visitors stopped coming, leaving only sadistic torturers and racists who enjoyed tormenting Clayton. As the electric shocks prolonged, Clayton's neural synapses gradually failed, reducing him to his current state.
After sharing all this, Rollo was too weak to stand, gasping for breath as he sat on a nearby chair. What Nish said next shocked him: she was Clayton's daughter, and her visit was no coincidence. The Clayton had no more value—no one was willing to pay to torture a vegetative person. The last visitor was Clayton's wife, heartbroken to see her husband in such a state. After repeated failed attempts to clear his name, she chose to end her life with pills.
Today was Clayton's birthday, and Nish wanted to give her father a gift—letting Rollo rest with him forever. The water earlier had been poisoned. As Rollo hovered near death, Nish extracted his consciousness and implanted it into her father's brain. After a full fifteen seconds of electric shock, both Clayton and Rollo were obliterated, vanishing from this world forever.
Feeling relieved, Nish left the museum and removed the plug obstructing the external air conditioner unit. Her car was fully charged. Nish drove off into the distance. On the passenger seat, the stuffed monkey joyfully emitted, "Monkey loves you." Behind her, the museum erupted in flames, turning to ashes along with Rollo's body.