Weekly Skylights: The Tripod Looks to the Clouds

Joey Cifelli ’23

A&E Editor

March 9, 2022 (Featured Image)

This is a description of a brand new medical procedure, developed by scientists. Assisting the scientists is a group of enigmatic inventors specializing in heavy metals. What have they gotten up to this time? The procedure ostensibly begins with a test subject, though this has yet to be confirmed by agents in the field. The subject is fit, healthy, and suitably responsive to government reprogramming. Three days prior to the operation, they are put on a diet consisting of nothing but water and nutrient blocks. Then, on the day of, the subject is wheeled in restraints to the examination room. It has been noted that subjects at this time often exhibit distress as a result of their restricted diet and mobility. At this point the venerable Doctor Eli Kurik takes over and shows the subject off to a group of military officials and oligarchs who will forever remain nameless. Upon their approval the subject is placed on the operating table and given a final sanitizing rinse. They are now ready to be stuck with the scalpel of progress. 6.1/10 

March 10, 2022 

The procedure, at its core, replaces red human blood with a synthetic blood concocted from futuristic alloys and bio-technology. Dr. Kurik and his team declined to give agents access to the ingredients of the new blood. Such information is apparently classified, though this did not stop said agents from being tracked down and slain by government street-sweepers mere hours after the procedure. “If only the current administration could be as ruthlessly efficient in all its dealings,” stated one family member of an erased agent. Said family member was subsequently erased in similar fashion. In the operating room, Dr. Kurik assures the audience that the silvery blood mixture is perfectly bio-compatible. Raised eyebrows are lowered and hands are put in pockets. The subject is then rendered unconscious via an amorphous cloud of gas and stabbed with a needle connected to a blood-sucking apparatus. 7.7/10 

March 12, 2022, Part 1 

The strange mechanism in the corner of the room swiftly exsanguinates the subject who now lies on the table like a walnut. New readers may only be familiar with synthetic walnuts, but true bio-walnuts were once known for their wrinkled skins and dry shells. The bloodless subject appears as one of these relics from an erased age. Before the subject terminates, Dr. Kurik’s unnamed assistant plugs a tube into their heart. The tube facilitates transfer of the magic blood into the subject from a vat in another corner of the room. Thick, lustrous blood disperses throughout the body, plumping up the flesh and tinting it the color of polished silver. Agents report relieved faces on Dr. Kurik and his team. Records indicate sudden subject vaporization at this step in previous procedures. 8.7/10 

March 12, 2022, Part 2 

Once the transfer is complete, the subject is roused via a tap on the shoulder. The subject appears drowsy and is unable to move. Dr. Kurik declares the procedure a total success. According to local propaganda, the subject is now blessed with enhanced strength and durability. In-house calculations show that the subject is theoretically immune to bullets as well, though only old readers will recall such crude implements. The procedure will be scaled up for mass production, pending further trials. Stolen government documents indicate plans to entirely re-blood the secret police, an effort which, agents say, would make normal human blood one of the more rare and valuable fluids of our time—up there with water. This has been another approved government experiment. Long live the current administration, and, as always, do not look outside after dark. 7.8/10