by Adam Moon
The General continued more quietly, “I’m worried about this unexpected occurrence; about your ability to interact with the artifacts. You’re an anomaly I didn’t anticipate and you know how much we military folks hate anomalies.”
Jack didn’t but he kept his trap shut to avoid looking like a dumbass.
“From now on I’ll be keeping as close an eye on you as they allow me. I hope you understand.”
Jack said “Sure” but he really had no idea what had the General so defensive.
The General continued, “I need you to write me a self evaluation about who you are and where you came from. Like a biography. I want to know everything, don’t hold back. I’ll have some men run additional background checks on you so don’t leave anything out or I will know. I want to know how many squares of TP you use when you wipe. I want to know what the first girl you kissed was wearing. You get me?”
Jack was about to say “go fuck yourself” but the General added, “I want to know how you felt when your parents and sister died” and the words stuck in his throat.
He hadn’t really spoken about that since his childhood and then only so the social workers could prove they did right by him and leave him alone.
He nodded and the General said, “I need to establish concrete trust with you as soon as possible. Just because Doc Collins is going out on a limb with you doesn’t mean that I can too. The only way I can trust you is to know you, hence the report I want you to type up about yourself.”
“Why don’t we just talk like normal human beings? That’s how people get to know each other. Maybe you missed the memo.”
Jack said it to provoke but the General ignored it, “I don’t have time for that. You can resume your duties after the report’s finished. I’ll check in on you later today.”
Chapter12: Biography
Jack was staring at the blank screen of his life. His fingers were poised over the keyboard but they refused to move. He just didn’t know where to start. He was mad too; mad that he had to do this bullshit just so the General could cover his own ass.
Billy refilled Jack’s coffee cup and Jack scowled at him, “Please don’t do that again officer. I don’t need a servant and we aren’t friends. Leave me alone while I do what your boss needs me to do.”
Billy didn’t say a word as he closed the door behind him. There relationship had never even had a chance to get off the ground. That was ok by Jack.
The formative years were a good place to start with his bio. He started pecking at the keys:
Name: Jack Mayberry
DOB: 3/7/84
My parents died when I was ten. I was at school and I can only guess they were taking my sister to the mall to get her some things for college. I think I remember them talking about it the night before.
My quiet boring but pleasant young life was flipped on its head after that.
I was sent to live with my uncle Nick. He was my mom’s younger brother. At first I didn’t feel very welcome there, I guess Uncle Nick never wanted kids and he never had any as far as I know. After a couple weeks we did seem to bond. Maybe it was because it took a couple weeks for the first of the foster checks to come his way. At ten years old I didn’t much care why, I was just glad I still had someone in my life who loved me.
I brooded a lot but I kept most of my darker, sadder thoughts from the psychiatrist. I now know that my shrink was an idiot; he should’ve been able to peal back the layers but he was a hack looking for an easy paycheck.
I had to switch schools when I moved in with Nick and that was traumatic but I suppose anything’s traumatic to a ten year old kid who has just lost his parents and sibling.
Uncle Nick had been a religious man his whole life but after mom died he gave it up. All the Jesus pictures and crucifixes came off the walls and he told me he stopped going to church altogether. He said it was because he refused to believe in a creator that would allow such pain. I was never raised religious although I had always kind of believed in some greater power, but after everything was taken from me I had to agree with him. There’s a suspicious part of me that thinks maybe Uncle Nick never really did leave the church because he was always gone on Sunday’s and his excuses that he was going to the bar or going to meet a lady friend never seemed to hold up to scrutiny; I guess old habits die hard, even bad ones.
Uncle Nick was a good replacement dad though. He signed me up for sports and encouraged me to enter model U.N. and came to everything from science fairs to soccer games.
He was a good dude and now that I’m writing this I have to give it to him; he probably made me the man I am today. Without him I would have been another tragic teen suicide.
Jack hit the enter button right away to log the beginning of his life story. He knew if he started rereading what he’d written he’d be at this forever, editing and chopping and elaborating here and there.
He refilled his coffee mug and swiveled in his chair. He thought about calling Billy in and seeing if he wanted a cup but fuck that guy.
He resumed the bio:
The nightmares began as soon as I went to live with Nick. It wasn’t his fault. He had me keep a dream journal and even convinced me to take it to one of my sessions.
The shrink looked at me like I had offended him and told me he didn’t stoop to dream analysis. It’s probably why I got into it in the first place.
With Nick’s help I got over the worst of the nightmares.
I remember one of them though, it was a recurring theme. Dad was coming home and it filled my heart with longing and sadness and an underlying elation. I would always wake up crying. But in the dream people were trying to stop him, I mean everyone; from the mailman to the President to complete strangers. I willed them to stop. I willed dad onwards, towards me but he never did arrive.
Uncle Nick took some classes or something because we started doing hypnosis sessions after each nightmare and pretty soon I stopped getting them. I probably shouldn’t have let an amateur hypnotize me but it worked.
I remember the feelings those dreams evoked in me like they just happened yesterday though. By the time the nightmares went away I think I was thirteen. I’m a little ashamed to admit I peed the bed at least once a month from ten to thirteen but it didn’t happen after the that, well, except that night I drank tequila in College.
Jack pressed enter because he felt the urge to delete the last part of the entry and he knew he shouldn’t.
He had to piss from all the coffee and probably from last night’s beer and from thinking about the bedwetting of his past but he didn’t want to walk past Billy or have him follow him to the restroom. He didn’t even know where the bathrooms were around here.
He walked over to one of the sinks set into the workbench and pissed a stream into the drain.
He wasn’t proud of it. It was just convenient.
He was shaking his dick when the General came walking in.
The General said dryly, “I’m sorry, I thought we’d provided you with everything you needed but I guess we forgot to stock up on diapers.”
There was nothing to say so Jack zipped up and took a seat behind his desk.
The General’s face screwed up in disgust and he walked to the sink and ran the faucet for an agonizingly long time.
“I’ll send maintenance down to clean your urinal, shall I?”
“What do you want?”
The General turned the faucet off, “I need you to get back to work on the artifacts. The self analysis can wait.”
“Make up your mind man.”
The General said as evenly as he could muster, “I expected you to be done by now. Listen, I don’t know if Doc Collins will decide that your work here’s beneath you but I think it’s of the utmost importance to continue so I need you to get as much done as possible just in case he takes you away from your current duties.”
Jack sighed. “The personal biography seemed of the utmost importance to you just a couple hours ago. I guess a lady has the right to chang
e her mind, huh?”
The General ignored Jack’s infantile dig and explained, “Like I said, I thought you’d have it completed by now. It doesn’t matter. Take your time with it, maybe devote an hour each morning to your bio, and then get back to work. I realize now it was wrong of me to expect you to do it all at once so quickly. But I’d be furious with myself if the Doctor took you away from me and the only research I had to show for your time here was a personal history. Billy will be back in a minute with the next artifact.”
Jack interrupted, “Are you going to tell me what these artifacts are, where they came from, what they’re made of?”
The General answered him as he was leaving the office, “I wouldn’t tell you even if I did know. How can I trust a man who pees in a sink?”
Chapter 13: The Red Ball
Billy arrived seconds later with a glass case and put it down on the counter. He was about to snap pictures but Jack told him to get the hell out.
Inside the case he saw several red balls about the size of tennis balls but shiny red, a metallic look to them.
With the arrival of the box of balls his mood darkened. Fuck the General, he thought, and fuck Billy and fuck every Goddamn gun toting bureaucrat in the whole Goddamn world. He felt like an Auschwitz guard; just following the horrific orders of the fucking Nazi’s. But the guards at Auschwitz didn’t get to use that defense as a plea, did they? Jack had to take some responsibility for what this big bureaucratic machine was trying to do and he didn’t even know what that was. Where did these artifacts come from and why was the military so interested? These were important questions that no one would answer.
He felt threatened anew and enslaved and naked and that’s why he stole one of the red balls from the case. He couldn’t justify it any other way. He didn’t particularly need it; he just wanted to screw the system in even a small way.
Touching the ball brought back feelings from those nightmares so long ago. As soon as he picked it up he felt loss and hope at once. It was the feeling from the dream where his dad’s trying to come home and everyone’s prohibiting it.
The ball weighed about as much as an average softball does and it was slippery in his hands. But the feelings it evoked in him was what made it special.
He jammed the ball in his desk drawer before the sadness overcame his senses. But as soon as it was out of his grasp, he wanted to hold it again, hold it to his chest and just let the tears run loose down his cheeks.
He shook his hands out and sat down. He typed:
A ball represents energy in turmoil. It can be seen as a symbol for the earth. To play with a ball means to attune yourself with your inner child.
The color red: see previous entry on the color red.
He settled back in his chair and swiveled toward the glass case. For the first time he noticed a small warning sign glued to the side wall of the case. It read, do not touch, deadly.
Billy stepped briskly into the office, “I forgot to tell you; the guards said don’t go near those things.” He was pointing at the case of balls.
“They said everyone that’s touched them has dropped dead.”
“How long before they died?” Jack was suddenly afraid.
“They were dead before they hit the ground. It happens immediately.”
Jack looked at the floor, “Jesus Christ. Well I’m done with them anyway.”
Billy scooped up the case and hurried off to the warehouse.
Why had he been drawn to the balls? What had drawn him to eat that apple? These artifacts were dangerous, even deadly to everyone else but he was fooling around with them without a care in the world. He needed to get a grip on this new version of reality.
Oh shit, he thought, I’ve just stolen government property.
He was about to call after Billy; see if he’d bring the case back so he could return the ball but it was too late. Billy would probably rat him out anyway.
He opened his desk drawer and the ball rolled to the front. He picked it up with a tissue and opened up a cabinet underneath a workstation. Inside was all the old chemistry equipment. He put the tissue wrapped ball in a beaker and shoved it to the back, behind all the other junk. It was the worst hiding place imaginable but it would have to do.
Suddenly he was hit with the realization that if it were to be discovered, the person who pulled it out would drop dead. He couldn’t live with that on his conscience but what else was there to do?
Billy returned with another glass case.
Jack assumed he was getting all the dangerous, high profile artifacts at once just in case he suddenly got pulled away from his tasks by the Doctor. Several more glass boxes followed and Jack knew he was right to suspect the General was feeding him all the dangerous stuff.
For the millionth time he wondered where the artifacts came from.
They weren’t of extra terrestrial origin. They were all so mundane and clearly originated on earth. What would an alien be doing with a teddy bear and a piece of steamy shit and an apple?
Maybe there was a wizard locked away in the bowels of the building, forced to conjure these objects out of thin air.
Maybe they came from another dimension similar to this one but just a little off.
Maybe they used to be ordinary objects but for whatever reason they’d been exposed to some type of exotic radiation by overzealous physicists.
He took some comfort in the knowledge that his questions might just be answered at two o’clock by Doctor Collins.
Just as he thought this, the Doctor came into the office and said, “I hope you didn’t forget our little meeting today.”
Jack looked at the clock on his monitor; it read that it was already two. He pressed enter even though he was only half way finished with the symbolism of cheese graters.
Billy stepped around the Doctor, grabbed the glass case and said, “I’ll be back in a minute.”
The Doctor said firmly, “Officer, your presence is not required. You don’t have the necessary clearance where we’re going.”
Billy looked thunderstruck and it made Jack smile. He must have thought he could ride his coattails all the way to a promotion. Jack mused, well dickhead, I might have asked the Doctor to reconsider except that you pointed a fucking gun at me yesterday.
Chapter 14: Going into the Bowels
Jack followed the shrunken, fat old man down one corridor after another.
The Doctor tried to make small talk asking how he liked it so far and whatnot but Jack kept his answers short because his mind was elsewhere.
They arrived at an elevator Jack hadn’t seen before and the Doctor needed to put a key in to get the doors to open. The doors were thick enough to be military style blast doors as they slowly opened. The Doctor had to use his key again once inside. As soon as he turned it the elevator lurched downwards. The ride only took a few seconds but by now they were easily four stories underground.
There were no guards waiting for them and the Doctor answered Jack before the question could leave his lips, “Very few people have access this deep. You are now one of less than a dozen people who have ever been down here.”
Jack wanted to act amazed or bug his eyes out or something to prove he appreciated the gravity of what the Doctor was doing for him but he couldn’t force it because he was pissed to see corridors snake out before him. He wasn’t unfit or lazy but enough was enough with this shit. Maybe he could ask for a bike or something just to get around.
He followed the Doctor. The corridors down here were dirtier and not as well lit. He guessed that of the dozen people allowed down here, a janitor was not among them.
His ears pricked as he started to hear faint, ghostly noises up ahead but the Doctor kept moving toward them so he had to too. The Doctor was amazed by him but that amazement would evaporate in an instant if Jack cowered behind because he thought he’d heard a ghost.
They came to a final doorway that had one security officer in front of it armed to the teeth. Judging by the figure, the guard
was female and a badass female she was. Jack saw fucking grenades hanging from her belt. She held an assault rifle in her arms and had two pistols holstered to each thigh.
She lifted the visor on her spaceman style helmet when she saw the Doctor approach. “Show it Doc” she said as she smiled warmly at the old man.
The Doctor handed her his weathered ID and she scrutinized it as though for the first time. She ran her scanner over it and handed it back.
The smile vanished from her face as she said to Jack, “Sir I need you to hand me your ID card.”
She spent twice as long on his and when she gave it back Jack was a little surprised when she smiled at him too.
“Welcome to the pit fellas.”
She held some fingers up to the security camera above the door and only then did Jack notice that there was a kind of gun affixed to the camera, like a wall turret or something.
The door behind her opened and once inside the boxy room they were subjected to clean room fans and UV.
Jack wished the guard would accompany them. Her smile was genuinely sweet and her face was pretty and for some reason the guns were a turn on. It was hard to see her butt but he tried anyway. She caught him staring just as the clean room doors shut between them. He was glad she caught him looking.
Mild flirtations were a nearly adequate distraction from all of the unnatural shit he had to deal with lately.
What Jack beheld as the doors whooshed open made him want to curl up on the floor in a ball and suck his thumb.
Chapter15: Creature discomforts
The warehouse was as big as the one above but with an open floor plan. Instead of shelves of inventory the place was filled with various barred cages that held creatures within them. It was like a creepy zoo down here except these weren’t your run of the mill animals.
