How to Measure

"Well this is the last place I expected to find you." Jamie stood at the top of the hill looking down at her colleague. The observatory loomed over them, the only shadow on the horizon. Everything else that was visible was made so by the stars.

Alice smirked. She was sitting on a grass-covered outcropping. Below her was a 50 foot fall into the ocean. "How could you ever find me if you don't expect to find me where you are?"

"I think you know what I meant."

"But think about it, if you were anywhere but where I was, how could you expect to find me there?"

"It's more about considering where you would be given your normal patterns." Jamie stepped down to stand next to where Alice was sitting. "You're not exactly the type to bask in the scenery. I think this might be the first time I've ever even seen you outside of a lab."

"I know what you mean," Alice said distantly. "I feel like I've run out of ways to research." She paused to point at a star, "We can calculate the mass of that star there. We know about how much it weighs, what it's made out of, and how much of it is being shot out across the universe and in what form those particles are in. But still, it feels like we're lacking something."

Jamie sighed. "I thought that's what all that research was for. To figure out what we needed to do to figure the rest out."

"All the theoretical physics that we know about means nothing if we can't see it in action. I need to know just what it is that we're missing."

"Do you think you're going to find it by staring into the night sky?"

"How can I expect to find it if I'm not where it is?"

------

Dr. Kraig Moleff stood in the center of a lecture hall addressing a room full of other researchers. "There's a great divide between popular belief and science. Right now, we're all looking into the chemicals and genes and biology that drives us as humans, yet still a greater portion of the world believes in a separate sentience that controls our actions irrespective of the brain. It is something we cannot measure, and just is. But, everything can be measured, we just need to find the right methods. Right now, our primary test subject should be waking up. I've spent years designing our new sensor. It does not respond to chemicals. It does not respond to muscle retractions. It does not respond to neuro-electricity. However, when connected across the heart cavity, it gets readings when a subject experiences certain emotions. With this test, we intend to determine if there is a separate origin point for emotional response."

The room erupted into a cacophony of questions and comments, mostly people completely bewildered at the very concept. A projector screen flickered on, and the room fell silent. "If you'll watch with me, we need to see how our subject responds to fear."

------

Barry woke up in his hospital bed. The anesthesia from the surgery was wearing off slowly. He coughed lightly and felt a tightness in his chest. He rubbed it lightly, not enjoying the soreness. A nurse came in before he even completed the thought. "Good afternoon. You've been asleep for a while. Just under two days. How are you feeling?"

"Fine. I guess. Was I supposed to be a sleep for that long?" He could feel his heartbeat pick up. It sounded abnormal, and the medical field was all about keeping things as close to normal as possible.

"Yep. For your surgery it was very important that you didn't feel anything. The anesthesiologist probably gave you a little extra to be sure. You'll be discharged later today if you're feeling all right." The last part almost sounded like a question, but was just firm enough to sound certain. Almost like the "if" wasn't necessary.

"Yeah, that sounds good. Is my girlfriend here to pick me up?"

The nurse was fiddling with various things in the room, and started writing on the charts. "Yep. She's in the waiting room right now. Do you want me to bring her in?"

"Yes. Please." Barry looked around the room. Too much like a hospital room. A clear plastic bag of his things laid on the chair. A little cart with a tray. A box of gloves hanging from the wall. It was all too sterile for him. Without the clutter of his home he felt out of place.

The nurse left and in less than two minutes, Emily walked in a hesitant smile on her face. "How are you feeling?" she asked meekly.

"I'm great. A little sore, but good."

She sighed a great sigh of relief and stepped up next to the bed. They wheeled him away on a bed two days ago and she hadn't seen him since. The updates she kept getting were short and unfulfilling. The second the nurse left the room, she went back to worrying. The fact that something could happen at any second was with her the entire time, until now.

------

"You do realize that the information we are gathering is based on information from millions of years ago right?" Alice said as she stood up.

Jamie nodded, but in the dark it was a meaningless gesture. "Of course."

"I don't think we'll ever have accurate measurements until we can get close. Even the sun is too far for use to measure properly. The particles that make up the atoms of our body are too far to measure properly. We can measure ourselves, and the things around us, but most things are too far for us to measure." She holds her hand up to the sky. "With my one hand I can block out hundreds of stars, each hundreds of miles wide. It clouds our judgement."

After a long slow breath she said, "You're really serious about this aren't you. But if you think about it, there's even more that we can't measure that's right in front of us, all around us all the time."

Alice looked up to Jamie, entranced by the thought. Was there more to be measured that her co-worker had thought of that she hadn't? "Tell me."

"Measure you curiosity."

------

"Here, there's a spike. For a moment in time, our subject experienced a moment of fear. Or some emotion, maybe hope or something. Our subject was kept alone for 40 hours and just a second after contact with a nurse, there was a spike. It's hardly noticeable on the chart, but it's there. We have people watching and computers watching this chart 24 hours a day. Even the slightest waver will be noted and documented. If we can measure emotion, and the intensity of it, we can determine if there is something other than chemicals and biology at work. We can determine once and for all what we as humans are. And we can measure it."

------

The ride home that night was quiet. Barry was dozing off in the car, and Emily didn't want to disturb him. They were one week away from their one year anniversary. It was on Emily's mind, but Barry had his surgery to focus on. She wasn't sure if he had thought about it as much as she did. Then again, she was certain he never put as much thought into things as she did. Why would this be any different? If only she could tell how much he thought about things and how much those things meant to him, it wouldn't be on her mind all the time. It took most of her teens in therapy to help her cope with the fact that she can't know what people were thinking, and that no one could. For some reason though, she always felt people had a better understanding of those things than she did. Like there was some unwritten way to tell when someone was thinking about someone else. Maybe there was an intensity of feeling that made what you were thinking about transparent. She had never once noticed how someone was feeling on someone's face, but almost everyone she knew had said it to her at least once.

Barry shifted in his seat and Emily's train of thought shifted. "I'm glad you're okay," she said quietly.

"Me too," he mumbled, still half-asleep.