by Brett Abell
“As satisfying as that seems, I’ve got bigger things to take care of.”
“You do realize that talking to yourself is the first sign of insanity.” Durgan had come up beside Beth. “Two beers,” he told Della when she looked his way.
“Don’t talk to that one; she’s liable to twist your balls up and smack you in the face with them,” Della said as she gave a sidelong glance to Beth.
“Oh, I see you two have already met.” Durgan laughed.
“Don’t you have a razor with your name on it? When you’re done cleaning up that five o’clock shadow, maybe you could drag it across your wrists,” Beth said to the bartender.
Della gave Beth the finger and walked off.
“I thought I was the one with rage issues. Holy shit, could you maybe tone it down a bit? Charlie is like a fluffy little rabbit; you start shaking that rattle of yours and he’s going to take off.”
“How’s this?” Beth turned to him. She looked demure as she batted her eyes. The hard edge of her lip softening to a slight scared tremble.
“Holy shit,” Durgan said after a minute. “I think I might know why Jimmy was scared enough to try and off you.”
“Is that a compliment?”
“Mostly. Okay, Charlie is in the bathroom. He has this sweating problem and he went to clean up. He’ll be back in a minute.”
“Wonderful, nothing turns me on more than abundant body odor.”
“Well, this is your lucky night then.”
“H … hi,” Charlie said, coming up to the bar. His hand was extended. Beth swore she saw droplets falling from his palm.
“Gross,” she hissed just as she took his hand. “Hi Charlie, I’m Beth.”
“Or Satan’s mistress.” Della had come back. “Hey, Charlie, haven’t seen you around here in a while.”
“Been busy.”
“Why don’t you go wipe something off, starting with that face. A little lye and bleach, you never know what you’ll reveal,” Beth said, moving so she was shielding Della from Charlie.
***
“Well, this was stupid,” Beth said as she fished through Charlie’s pockets. Durgan had carried a passed-out Charlie from the bar to his car. “I was just drinking enough with the hopes he’d start to look better. I didn’t think he’d get so drunk after two shots and a beer.”
“He doesn’t get out much. What now?”
“Well, I just gave him my number. We’ll see if he calls tomorrow.”
CHAPTER THREE
Charlie awoke the next day. The sun was shining bright and a spike was nestled deeply in his frontal lobe. “Ugh, where am I?” He looked around. He was sitting behind the wheel of his old, faded yellow Datsun. His mother called the color diaper duds because of its resemblance to baby shit. A stickie note was stuck to his windshield right in his field of vision. He felt somewhat better when he realized it was Beth’s number. He couldn’t recall ever seeing a more beautiful woman, and he’d scoured the Internet for all manner of depravity.
“Oh shit, am I late for work?” The car turned over with a grinding noise, followed by the squeal of a loose belt, then the chugging of an engine seriously in need of some timing adjustment. The radio came to life; a glowing green screen displayed the time as 7:45. He had fifteen minutes to make it to work on time. That he couldn’t change clothes was all right, considering he wore a lab coat, but he would have loved to take a nice, hot shower and maybe shove some toast into his seriously hung-over self.
The car sputtered and let out a small mushroom cloud of black smoke as he pulled out of the parking lot.
“What do you think?” Durgan asked Beth as they watched Charlie pull away.
“I think I’m going back to my hotel room and get some sleep. He just about promised me a look at his work last night. One more date, this time without booze, and I should be in.”
“Good, this place gives me the creeps.”
“What?” She turned to look at him.
“I don’t know what it is. It’s like everything is just TOO nice and it can’t be real. Like we’re being set up. I keep expecting something like a hideous clown to come jumping out of every shadow.”
“The mighty Durgan afraid of something?”
“Just clowns, just fucking clowns.”
“Oh look, there’s a circus coming to town!” Beth laughed as they passed a billboard on the side of the road.”
“I don’t know why Jimmy didn’t try to kill you sooner.” He shivered and sped up to get past the sign.
***
“What the hell is this?” Charlie asked as he pulled into the parking lot. A large military truck was parked in front; this was flanked by two hummers in front and two in back. Eight military personnel were in a loose circle around the truck, guns not drawn, but they looked alert and ready for any sort of trouble.
“Charlie, Charlie! Thank goodness you’re here.” Professor Springland was a slight, spectacled man. He did his best to fit into the prototypical role of university professor. The only thing that made him even the slightest bit able to fulfill this position was his numerous tweed jackets with leather-bound elbows. It was a well-known, albeit quiet, fact that Charlie did most of the heavy lifting in the research lab.
“What’s going on, Professor?”
“These military chaps say that their truck is on the verge of breaking down and they need to store some stuff here.”
“Stuff, Professor? What kind of stuff?”
“An experimental virus of some sort.”
“Virus? Who’s in charge?”
“That man there; Major Talbot, I believe is his name.”
“Major Talbot?” Charlie approached the man. He was close to six feet tall and short, salt-and-pepper hair peeked out from his military hat. A face that appeared to have seen too much in one lifetime turned to look at him.
“Can I help you?” the major asked.
“I work here. The professor says that you want to try to leave a virus here.”
“Just for the night while we secure new transportation.”
“Major, we’re not rated for virus storage.”
“You have level-two containment vessels, you have negative pressure seals on the laboratory doors, and your freezer is close to the negative eighty Celsius we need.”
“Viruses, and I would imagine highly infectious ones that necessitate all these guards, need level-one containment vessels and exactly negative eighty degree Celsius storage, not close to.”
“This isn’t really open for debate …”
“Charlie.”
“Charlie. And what’s your specific title?”
“Laboratory Assistant.”
“Okay, Charlie the Laboratory Assistant who, by the way, looks like shit and reeks of alcohol. You are the closest facility in over a hundred miles that even approaches what we truly need. Would you rather I break down ten miles out of town and what is in there is let out on the peripheries of your mighty nice-looking town?”
“Umm.”
“And while you are internally debating with yourself, I’ll let you know that our freezer system shut down nearly thirty minutes ago. Thankfully, it’s not summer and there is a slight fall snap in the air but not really anything approaching negative eighty degrees. I’m thinking we’ve got an hour before we hit critical mass and the dormant virus I have in the truck becomes active. Won’t that be a hoot!”
“It’s contained, isn’t it?” Charlie asked alarmed.
“In so much as a truck can be expected to contain a deadly virus.”
“De … deadly?”
“Do we really look like the type of people that would be carrying beneficial viruses? It’s for one night. There’s already a replacement transport ordered. My men will be guarding this shipment and the facility for the night.”
“He … here?”
“Am I blowing your mind, Charlie? Let me strip this down so even a laboratory assistant will grasp this. We have an incredibly deadly, genetically modified virus tha
t we are going to store here overnight. In the meanwhile, my men, who are highly trained in the arts of dealing death themselves, are going to keep an eye on it because if this were to get into some unsavory hands, a lot of very, very bad things would happen. Am I making sense?”
“I’m sorry. Of course. It was a long night for me; I’m just wrapping my mind around this. Normally we don’t deal with anything past a rhinovirus here.”
“I want to be very clear, Charlie. This makes the rhinovirus seem like a nice walk during spring, in a meadow of flowers after the prettiest girl you know just gave you a blowjob and you won the lottery. Are we clear?”
Charlie nodded.
“My men will be guarding this place, and as soon as we have it locked down this building will be effectively closed.”
“You can’t just shut down a research facility.”
“How would you like to talk to the Chief of Homeland Security?” the major asked him.
“I think I’d like to. There are some things I need to do.”
“It will be from a jail cell.”
“I have experiments that are time sensitive.”
“Your anti-viral cold medicine is going to have to wait, Charlie.”
“How … how do you know about that?”
“I work for the Feds, Charlie. If I wanted to, I could find out how many shits you took last week.”
“Really?” he asked with a questioning stare.
“Fuck, I thought you scientist types were supposed to be smart.” The major turned away when one of his men came up to him.
“Major, the room is ready.”
“Thank you, Corporal Jackson. I want you in full haz-mat before you move the package.”
“Sir, it won’t really matter.”
“Just do it; it would make me feel better.”
“What level suit do you have?” Charlie asked.
“It’s an impermeable suit with a self-contained breathable apparatus,” the major answered. He was supervising as his men got the corporal dressed.
“Why would the captain say that the suit wouldn’t matter?”
“It’s ‘corporal,’ and I probably shouldn’t be saying anything, but I want to impress on you just how dangerous this thing is. The virus is housed within an acidic compound that will eat through most rubber in a few seconds, glass in a minute or so, and if enough of it spills, it will eventually make its way through steel.”
“Are you insane?”
“Excuse me?”
“Why would you create anything like that?”
“Charlie, do I look like I created this thing? I shoot things, I take orders, well, most of the time. I’m a delivery boy and nothing else. Do I wish I lived in a time where something like this was not invented? You can bet your ass. The acid is just the start of it; the real monster lies within. You do not want this thing loose, ever. I hope someone much higher up understands that and just squashes this entire experiment.”
“How do you move it? I mean, doesn’t it just go through every material it’s exposed to? Do you have some special alloy you are using?”
“You’d think. No, it’s housed in thick glass. Relax, the compound is inert until it’s exposed to oxygen. It’s created and packed in a vacuum. As long as it stays air-tight, we’re good to go.”
“I can’t tell you how much better I feel right now.”
“Ah, sarcasm, a man after my own heart. We’ll be out of here tomorrow, and then you’ll have a good story to use to get into some undergrad pants.”
Charlie blushed.
“You’ve got ten minutes; go in, get what you need, and then get out. Have a day off on the government’s dime.”
Charlie went inside as the major directed, but he didn’t grab anything. Instead, he went to his workstation and after a few seconds, he was inside the security program for the building. He changed a few settings and also unlocked the window in his office. Two of his experiments were at a critical phase. If he missed the window of opportunity, he would lose six months of valuable research time, and he just couldn’t allow that to happen. He’d come back tonight and do what needed to be done. His lab was on a different floor than the military would be housing their compound. They’d never even know he was there. When he was done, he walked outside and passed by the major without saying anything.
Major Talbot eyed him for a second; he had a sneaking suspicion something wasn’t quite right, but the man seemed meek enough. Probably just pissed off that his routine had been disturbed was his last thought concerning Charlie Noble that day.
“Get some tape on his cuffs,” he said, turning back to Corporal Jackson, who was nearly completely covered.
***
“I’m so glad you could meet me for dinner!” Beth said excitedly as she reached across the small table and lightly touched his hand.
Charlie pulled his hand back like he’d been burned. Then sheepishly smiled at her for his social faux pas. “I’m not very good at this.”
“Really? I thought you were doing fine.” She flipped her hair back and slowly wet her lips.
Charlie gulped heavily before drinking his entire glass of water. “I’m glad you came too; I had nothing else to do today. Wait, that’s not the way I meant to say that.”
Beth lightly laughed. “Okay, what did you mean to say?”
He blushed again.
I thought Durgan was exaggerating when he said this guy had no experience. I’ve seen fifth graders act cooler, she thought.
“I mean, I, ah, got out of work today. That’s why I got to see you.”
“Was that so hard? Why did you get out of work? Were you not feeling too good because of last night?”
“No, the military is at the school. They’re dropping some stuff off.”
Beth instantly became interested. She’d almost been operating in cruise control. Manipulating Charlie was proving to be easier than stealing candy from an invalid, something she’d had practice with. Of course, she’d only been nine, but it went a long way to proving the proclivity for being evil she would display later in life.
“Dropping stuff off? What kind of stuff?”
“I’m not really supposed to say.”
Now Beth was all ears, though no one would have been able to tell. Except for the slight increasing of her irises expressing she was excited, her demeanor did not change. She reached across the table and lightly touched Charlie’s arm. She watched as a flow of red ran up the sides of his neck and bloomed onto his face like fireworks. She held his gaze for a second or two.
The waitress came over to the table and coughed softly to announce herself. Charlie sputtered and stuttered, and Beth laid a cold gaze upon her for interrupting the moment.
“My name is Cathy; can I start you off with some drinks?”
“I … um … I don’t know.”
“He’ll have a Long Island Iced Tea and I would like your house Chardonnay.”
“I really don’t think I should drink again tonight.”
“Such a kidder.” Beth smiled, her contempt thinly disguised before turning to the waitress to dismiss her. “You’re still here?”
“Bitch,” Cathy said under her breath as she left the table.
Charlie excused himself to freshen up. Beth could not help but notice how he tried to hide his erection as he stood.
The waitress came back with the drinks.
“You’re welcome,” she said snidely when she put the drinks on the table and had not received the social matter of a thank you.
“Listen, you little minimum-wage bitch; your job is to get me stuff when I order it. I don’t think that requires any sort of etiquette. I say ‘fetch,’ you get. That’s the relationship we have right now. If I wanted to hear you speak, I’d tell you what to say. Too bad about your tip too because I’m not giving you one. I heard what you said when you walked away from the table earlier.”
Cathy’s eyes got big.
“Now considering you’re a middle-aged, frumpy-looking thing, I’
m going to go out on a limb here and say you have not made the wisest decisions in life, especially with your career choices and that you really need this job. How long do you think you’ll be working here if I go find your boss and tell him what you said? Maybe I’ll even say you spit on my food.”
“I did not!” Cathy said in indignation.
“I don’t give a shit; I’ll tell him whatever I need to, to get you canned. And, honey, I don’t think you’ll be able to go down the street to the Hidey Hole to do any stripping any time soon. I guess maybe you better get used to the phrase, ‘want fries with that?’”
“You … you can’t. I have rent … I have a kid at home.”
“Maybe you should have thought of that before you called a valued customer such a rude word.”
Charlie was coming back and he sat down, oblivious to the confrontation going on. “Thank you,” he told her when he grabbed his drink.
“Oh yes, we would love an appetizer sampler. For free? That is so nice of you.” Beth placed her hand to her chest. “Now leave.”
“She seems nice,” Charlie said as he took a drink.
“Yeah, she’s a peach.”
Charlie drank two drinks. Midway through the second, he spilled what was going on at the university. By the time he’d finished, she’d convinced him to show her where he worked.
Charlie grabbed the check when it was dropped off. “There’s a mistake,” he told her.
“No mistake. Just wanted to say thank you. Dinner is on me.” The words she said to answer Charlie, but she was looking at Beth.
“Thank you? Thank you for what?” Charlie looked up at her.
“Well, let’s go lover,” Beth said as she helped him up.
“Lover?” His head whipped back.
They had just about gone out the doors when Beth took her arm from Charlie’s and went back to the hostess station where a pert little brunette was looking down at a seating chart. A portly man, who smelled of cod liver and scallions was looking over her shoulder.
“Oh, hi miss,” the hostess said in her overly cheery voice Beth figured she’d used just the year before on the cheer squad.
