The Soulmate System

23. A Theme of Protection

This wasn't a term that people in primary or secondary education learned about, but they understood the parameters of it through informal learning. It was mentioned profusely in the Museum of Natural History's exhibit on Soulmates, but described in only the vaguest terms.

The Asch Protection Effect was never meant to exist in the general public.

And overall, it didn't.

But Dylan stepped into the darkened room of 1013, after crossing the boundaries of the hospital into the Soulmate Institute, and found himself faced with a long dashboard littered with moving dials, blinking lights, and monitors noting everything. On the other side of reinforced glass sat his Soulmate, still curled in a ball with his hair whipped around by the torrential storm that surrounded him. The glass refused to budge from the winds and held true to protect the four medical personnel who worked, seated, at the base of the windows, taking careful observations.

"...hello?" Dylan asked, voice hoarse, after several uncomfortable moments with his back pressed to the wall by the door.

Two turned their heads, but the darkness only shielded their faces. "Who is that? Is that Markus?" asked one.

"N-no, it...it's Mr. Houghton's Soulmate." His voice remained quiet and sore sounding.

"Oh, please send him in," the other answered, and the two returned to making observations.

Dylan's eyes darted between the two opposite walls before he carefully opened the door again and closed it loudly. Clearing his throat quietly, he asked, more definitively, "Hello?"

"Mr. Matthews?"

"Y-yes."

"You can sit right here, if you'd like." Dylan remained standing, but moved closer to the window to listen better to the man's slightly muffled voice.

Dylan didn't move. "Okay, what-what's wrong with him?"

"Do you know what the Asch Effect is?" asked one, swiveling around in his chair to face him.

Dylan nodded. "It's...like a, protection thing."

Placing down her paperwork, a woman stood up and stepped towards him. "You know, how, when you can't get someone's passcode on their phone, it locks you out for a specific amount of time?" Dylan nodded slowly, eyes darting between the side of her head and Bryce. "The Asch Effect is simply that – protection built into the Soulmate System. You see, we have records of the Effect starting from the twelfth century, so it was an evolutionary type of – "

"Yeah, that's great and all," Dylan interrupted, "but I want to know what's happening with Bryce. Like, is he dying? How long will he be...locked in that? Can he hear us?"

"Medically speaking, the Asch Effect puts the body in a temporary comatose state; the metabolism slows, heartbeat slows, activity in the brain declines just enough for him to last a very long time...like that. See?" She pointed to the still-curled up Bryce in the centre of the room before gesturing to monitors towards the ceiling. "We're monitoring his vitals as we speak, to make sure nothing happens to him." The woman suddenly glanced down and continued, "We...don't know when he'll come out of stasis. Circumstances are various, b..."

It was Dylan's turn to feel like everything in his chest had been scooped out. Her speech drowned out over the man's own rampant thoughts, Dylan suddenly asked, "Can he hear me?"

"Not if you step in there," she replied. "We're recording winds up to just over one hundred and thirty-three kilometers per hour." She looked eagerly to the Soulmate. "It's...incredible. We've never had the chance to study this kind of emotional breakdown for a Soulmate since the Patterson Study – "