Third of September
Doctor Skaarsgard,
Allow me first to offer recompense in regards to the recent fire at the medical facilities founded and headed by your person. It is a great tragedy not only that so many lives have been lost but that a number of scientific developments were lost as a result. I have heard that you suffered injuries as a result of your attempts to save both patients and the developments and I assure you that my people wish you a full recovery. However, given that you failed in both these tasks, I am afraid that I must depart with the pleasantries and begin with the reason that I wrote this letter.
Your organisation, Dr Skaarsgard, was built upon the promise of a cure. It was intended as a scientific institute, as a medical organisation and in both these respects, it has failed. Several reports have confirmed that the fire was a result of a patient, in a tragic form of suicide, set herself on fire and so caused the death of several patients and the destruction of this organisation. I, for one, cannot understand how it is that the staff and the management failed to protect both this woman and other patients from this destructive and violent demise. It calls into question how politicians, sponsors and donors should react to this news. There were, it would appear, no safeguards to ensure that those with the disease were protected from potential lapses in judgement and we can never be sure whether it was suicide or a loss of control that caused such travesties. In a world where magic has become a feature and function of our lives, to see it become used as a tool for such mass destruction, calls into question the judgement of those who supported this venture. I, for one, am considering retracting all funding as a result of this failure and would argue that those responsible for this loss of life be held accountable in a court of law where it should be ruled that the staff and management failed to protect the lives of those entrusted into their care.
Regardless, this matter is second to the more crucial point. While I was not aware that such progress had been made towards a cure, this loss of life is irrelevant when one hears of the reports that several promising scientific discoveries, investments in the future of a cure, were the victim of this fire. Your heroic efforts were in vain and a serious question is being raised about the containment and protection of this scientific progress. It seems reasonable to me that all promising medical discoveries, scientific progress, etc. should be set aside in a separate building to ensure the greatest protection against such incidents. It would appear, however, that you have failed to consider this. You failed to protect the lives of those who suffered this terrible disease and, in doing so, risked shifting this disease from the major problem it is to a pandemic where the world collapses beneath the weight of this disease. Your injuries, the damage to the organisation, the damage done to the reputation of all those who supported this venture, all this would be irrelevant if we had something to show for it. We do not. We have nothing! Because of you, Dr Skaarsgard! You are responsible for their deaths. You are responsible for all the deaths that come in the future, responsible for all those who gave hope to this venture and were left disappointed, responsible for all those who suffer with these disease, tormented by dreams of scorching flames and screaming voices! All this – because of you!
Perhaps in hindsight you will realise what you have done, how great and vast this failure is. You may not consider me a powerful politician and neither may you consider me a considerable representative of elected officials but rest assured that this will end. You will be judged according to your past and future actions. What you do now will be recorded in the history books. I, the people, the world, needs assurance that our faith in you was not in vain. We need assurance that the darkness that has overcome us, that the burning light of the fire was naught but a minor failure. No more can we have promises and words. We must see the future. We must know what is coming. Without this, the future of this organisation is in jeopardy. Not by my hand or by the hand of any other. It will be by your hand. Safeguards must be put in place to protect vulnerable patients who pose a risk to the lives of others and the development of a cure. Restrain them if it is considered necessary. The great leaders of the world have stopped at nothing to provide all that you have requested and yet the staff could not watch over a woman who is now little more than a charred corpse, a name along a list. When people come to remember this event, they must remember it as the day that the world rose from its mourning and said to itself - “This is not the end.” You are a doctor. Begin the healing process or watch your creation crumble like the ruins of old.
With deepest regret,
Mr V. Demaris
