PATIENT THIRTEEN: THE FORGOTTEN LARYNX EXPERIMENT

Season 1

CHAPTER 1: THE ROOM WITH NO ECHO

Dnipropetrovsk, Ukraine — October 3rd, 1986.

Underground Wing C, Block-47.

02:13 AM Local Time. Tape Archive: #LX-093-13

The elevator descended with a whine of neglected hydraulics, carrying Dr. Viktor Nadrov into the sublevels of Block-47. The air smelled of iodine and something older...wet cement, or perhaps the residue of last week’s failed sterilization. His reflection warped in the brushed steel doors, a gaunt man in a coat two sizes too large, the fabric yellowed under the flickering bulb.

They called her Thirteen because she arrived with no name, no medical chart, and no vocal cords.

Not missing.

Absent.

Her intake photograph showed a woman in her mid-thirties, her face a study in Soviet anonymity....brown hair, wide-set eyes, a mouth neither smiling nor frowning. But the X-rays told the real story: where her larynx should have been, there was only a smooth, uninterrupted tract of tissue. No scar. No surgical intervention. As if evolution itself had skipped the step.

Viktor stood before her cot now, sweating through his white coat. The room was a perfect cube, walls lined with soundproofing foam that had yellowed with age. No windows. No vents. Just a single drain in the floor, its grate clogged with strands of dark hair.

She had not moved in twelve days.

She did not eat.

She did not blink.

But tonight, the room gave off an echo....even though no one had spoken.

Viktor’s penlight trembled as he checked her pupils. Unresponsive. Yet when he leaned closer, he caught the scent of her breath....not the sour tang of starvation, but something metallic, like a wet coin pressed to the tongue.

“Did… you hear that?” he asked the nurse, Dasha.

She stared at him, hand frozen over the chart. The clipboard’s metal clip had left crescent indents in her palm.

“I didn’t say anything, Doctor.”

But the room had responded.

Somewhere in the walls:

“…torrrr…”

A whisper. Or the groan of pipes.

Dasha’s throat moved as she swallowed. “We should....”

The overhead light buzzed, dimmed, then brightened.

Thirteen’s fingers twitched.

Not a spasm.

A wave.

One after another, as if typing on an invisible keyboard.

Viktor’s stomach dropped.

The room had no echo.

But something had answered.

CHAPTER 2: SYMPTOM OF A NEW ORGAN

Dnipropetrovsk Underground, Wing C – October 5th, 1986

03:02 AM. Tape Log: #LX-093-13 SUPPLEMENTAL

Dasha’s hands shook as she threaded the reel-to-reel tape. The machine was a Czech-made Tesla NG 412, its casing cracked from a drop during transport last winter. It shouldn’t have been in Block-47. Nothing from the linguistics department was cleared for this wing. But the night-shift guards turned a blind eye for a bottle of Stolichnaya and two West German cigarettes.

She adjusted the azimuth knob. A pointless gesture....the microphone was taped to Thirteen’s bed frame, its diaphragm pressed against cold iron. It would only capture vibrations. Structural ones.

Viktor watched from the doorway, his silhouette warped by the fisheye lens of the security mirror. "You’re wasting supplies," he muttered. His breath fogged the glass. "She’s catatonic. The Komitet will audit us if...."

A click.

The tape rolled.

Dasha didn’t look up. "You heard it too."

04:17 AM.

The nurses’ station coffee had gone cold, the sludge at the bottom of the cup streaked with condensation rings (a word Viktor misspelled in his log, later scribbled over). He flipped through Thirteen’s file....not her real file, the one stamped СЕКРЕТНО, but the sanitized version for the Ministry.

Page 12: "Subject exhibits no laryngeal structures. No prior surgical intervention. Congenital absence unlikely due to...."

The rest was redacted.

A drip echoed from Wing C’s hallway. The pipes always leaked after midnight.

Or maybe it was the drain in Thirteen’s room.

The one clogged with hair too long to be hers.

06:55 AM.

Playback.

Dasha’s nail tapped the Tesla’s counter as the spool turned. Static. Then....

A wet thud.

Not a voice. Not a moan.

The sound of a lung expanding against bone.

Viktor’s pen froze. "Rewind it."

They listened seven times.

Between 03:12 and 03:43 AM, the tape recorded a subharmonic resonance. 42 Hz. The frequency of a human femur vibrating in wet plaster.

Dasha’s throat tightened. "That’s not… that’s inside her."

Viktor grabbed the stethoscope.

07:22 AM.

Thirteen’s ribs had reshaped overnight.

Her left side caved inward, the ribs bent like a corset pulled too tight.

Her right side bulged, the intercostal skin stretched translucent.

And between them.....

A ridge of tissue, crimson and quivering.

Viktor pressed the stethoscope to it.

A sound came through:

"...шшш..."

The Russian whisper for hush.

But Thirteen’s mouth never moved.

Dasha stumbled back. "It’s learning."

Viktor’s glove came away damp.

The ridge had licked the latex.

CHAPTER 3: LANGUAGE OF THE SOFT

Addendum to Patient #13 – October 9th, 1986

Log by Nurse Darya "Dasha" Volkov (Unauthorized)

The ribs are singing.

Not metaphorically.

At 02:17 AM, I pressed a glass beaker to Thirteen’s chest and heard it resonate like a Theremin tuned to a dying man’s pulse.

Dr. Nadrov refuses to document this.

He scribbles in the margins of Form #47-L ("Non-Standard Biological Growth") but leaves the frequency column blank. The Ministry requires numbers. He gives them poetry:

"Subject’s tissue exhibits… rhythmic keratinization…"

Lies.

This morning, Thirteen’s sternum split. Not a wound....a deliberate parturition.

From the fissure:

A sound.

Not a voice.

A wet vowel, shaped by something without lungs.

I recorded it on X-ray film (wasteful, but tape distorts the lower registers). Developed in the darkroom, the film showed indentations...not soundwaves, but letters.

Cyrillic.

"ЖИВОЙ" (Alive).

But the "O" was inside-out, like a glove peeled from a flayed hand.

Addendum ... Nurse Olga’s Dream Log (Confiscated)

"She said we built her wrong. That’s why it came through."

Olga woke screaming.

When I asked "What came through?" she clawed at her own throat until blood dripped into her shoes.

At 04:33 AM, the hospital lights pulsed 3 times.

All patients coded "13" (Room 13, Bed 13, even 13-year-old leukemia case #413) died simultaneously.

Except her.

Thirteen’s new "larynx" bloomed outward, a carnivorous tulip of gristle and teeth.

It repeated Olga’s scream....perfectly....though Thirteen never heard it.

CHAPTER 4: THE REHEARSAL SKIN

Ministry of Health Incident Report #4479 (Partial Declassification: 1991)

Section 3: Epidermal Anomalies (Annotations by Dr. L. Petrov, 1987)

The skin didn’t peel...it retired.

At 03:08 AM on October 12th, Thirteen’s outer layer slid free in a single sheet, curling at the edges like parchment held over a flame. The underside was ridged with patterns resembling soundwave fossils.

Nadrov ordered it bagged for biopsy.

But when the orderly reached for it, the skin twitched upward, adhering to his glove like static-charged plastic. He screamed....not from pain, but because it vibrated against his palm, emitting a sound his teeth registered as:

“You put your fear in us. We wore it.”

The orderly quit that night. His wife later reported he chewed his own tongue off, claiming it was “redundant.”

Laboratory Addendum (Suppressed)

We stretched the skin sample over a Petri dish, rigged a phonograph needle to trace its ridges. The speaker output was language, but:

Frequency: 9 Hz (below human hearing....felt in the jaw).

Content: A loop of Nadrov’s voice saying “She wasn’t supposed to hear us”....a phrase he swears he never spoke.

Dasha insisted we test the shedding process live. At 05:17 AM, we witnessed:

Thirteen’s collarbone distended, stretching the epidermis like taffy.

A seam split from sternum to navel with the precision of a letter opener.

The new skin beneath was translucent, pulsing with dark veins that branched in Cyrillic script.

Then Dasha collapsed.

Her eyes rolled back, showing only the bloody sclera as her throat clicked and reproduced Thirteen’s external larynx’s vibrations:

“…vein speech… your voice was never yours…”

When she awoke, her tongue was fused to her palate.

The skin sample had vanished from the sealed dish.

CHAPTER 5: THE SPINAL VERSE

Biopsy Report – October 14th, 1986 (Leaked via KGB Archivist #9)

Pre-Incision Notes:

Subject’s external larynx now measures 12 cm, with 7 distinct folds resembling vocal cords but made of femoral cartilage.

Respiration causes the folds to click in iambic pentameter.

Procedure:

Scalpel made contact at 11:14 AM.

Incision emitted a steam of blood that defied gravity, arcing upward into the ceiling IV bag.

The bag inflated with 40°C blood (impossible....patient’s core temp was 32°C).

Then Thirteen’s spine twisted.

Not a seizure....a deliberate unfurling, vertebrae rotating to expose their flat surfaces. Each bone bore raised text, not carved but grown, like keloid scars:

“She will sing when there are no tongues left. When all fear is taught by meat.”

Nadrov vomited. The intern fainted into the autoclave tray.

Then the lights cut.

In the dark, something knocked....three times....from inside Thirteen’s ribcage.

Backup power revealed:

Her liver had risen beneath the diaphragm, pressing against the ribs.

The organ’s surface bore cursive scarring:

“VIKTOR NADROV, RECIPIENT.”

His own handwriting, down to the smudged “k” he always over-wrote.

Dasha whispered: “She’s not learning language. She’s teaching it to us.”

Then the heart monitor flatlined....despite Thirteen’s smile widening.

CHAPTER 6: SURGICAL WITNESS

OR Transcript – October 16th, 1986 (Recovered from Melted Tape)

05:55 AM:

Nadrov: “....scalpel....”

Scalpel screams on contact with the larynx. Frequency matches Nadrov’s daughter’s voice (Note: Daughter died in 1982).

Intern #3 vomits teeth.

06:12 AM:

Suture thread vibrates, spelling “НЕТ” (No) in Morse code.

Thirteen’s abdomen splits autonomously.

Liver extrudes like a tongue, slapping the intern’s cheek. Leaves burn mark in shape of Hebrew “Aleph” (??).

06:30 AM:

Nadrov: “....clamp the....”

Clamp teeth chatter, recite Pushkin’s “Demons” in reverse.

Thirteen’s pupils dilate, showing spinal text reflected in miniature.

06:42 AM:

Lights fail.

Wet crunching.

Dasha (over intercom): “You are the patient now.”

Tape ends.

Post-Op Findings:

All participants missing except Nadrov.

Autoclave contained 17 lbs of hair and a perfect mold of Dasha’s face in boiled fat.

Thirteen sealed her own incisions with embossed skin.

CHAPTER 7: STATION LX-093 TERMINATED

KGB Disposal Order #9823 (Annotations by Survivor #2)

“Wing C collapse attributed to substandard concrete … no evidence of biological contamination…”

Lie.

They burned the bodies, but:

The ash piled itself into word-shaped mounds overnight.

The fire extinguishers leaked black fluid that spelled “forgive” in Church Slavonic.

One folder survived. Inside:

A vellum sheet of Thirteen’s skin.

When held to light, it projected a film reel of Dasha mouthing “It’s in the x-rays.”

The text: “To be continued. Not by choice.”

Final Note:

The pathologist who analyzed the waveform-skin hung himself with IV tubing. His suicide note:

“They weren’t vocal cords. They were receivers. She wasn’t speaking. She was channeling.”

CHAPTER 8: THE SECOND LANGUAGE (FINALE)

Volgograd Medical Institute – April 2023

Incident Report #MIR-0415 (Classified)

Mira found the tape inside a desk that wasn’t on the floorplan. The drawer:

Locked with a 1960s KGB seal.

Lined with scratch marks and dried mucus.

Contained a 1986 calendar, October 3rd circled in iodine.

The cassette played silence...but her fillings resonated.

Her boyfriend called. Before she spoke, he whispered: “Why is your skin praying?”

Then:

The tape melted, burning her hand with cold.

Her ribs ached, the pain mapping the Cyrillic “Ж” (Zh....alive).

Her roommate opened the door....

Mira’s throat unzipped.

Not a wound....a second mouth, its teeth shaped like tiny vertebrae.

The roommate understood.

Because her own ribs had begun humming the same tune.

Season 1 Ends......

Case File: LX-093-13

Location: Block-47, Wing C, Dnipropetrovsk Psychiatric Facility

Date: October 3, 1986

Recovered Item: Sealed spinal x-ray with engraved Cyrillic verse

Status: RESTRICTED. Last seen Volgograd Institute Archive, April 2023

Stay Tuned for Season 2 Arriving This Thursday

===============================================

Your voice isn’t yours anymore.

Tag 3 friends before they dream in your skin.

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