Langstrom dialled up the volume on the sound system and shut his eyes, letting Brahms' Third Symphony swell in his ears. The music conjured memories of happier times with his beautiful wife, before his diagnosis, before the rot set in.
The tinnitus had been subtle at first, like the low hum of a refrigerator in another room, a mildly irritating whine he couldn't quite place yet couldn't quite ignore.
As the weeks wore on, the noise grew overwhelming, until Kirk could hear nothing else unless he concentrated hard enough. The doctor's words, however, had been loud and clear.
Kirk's affliction was rare, chronic and irreversible.
The thought of never enjoying his favourite symphonies again was agonising, but it was Francine's voice he could miss the most; the subtle inflection she adopted when she teased him, and the way she laughed, as though the little girl inside her had never grown up.
Kirk wasn't prepared to let all that go without a fight. He was a man of science, for Christ's sake! And science would find a way.
The answer, Kirk knew, was staring up at him from the dissection table.
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