A Blemish On The Curve Ch 05

Lucas snapped awake, his phone buzzing fitfully on his nightstand as it rang out strangely into the darkness of his bedroom. He lurched over to the side in his bed, catching up his phone awkwardly in a frustrated flurry -- he wasn't used to being called at this hour of the night. What on earth was going on!?

He looked down and saw that it was Rick who was calling him. Frowning slightly, Lucas answered, not quite knowing why there was something a bit off, a cold pit of some sort, that was beginning to develop in his stomach.

"Hey...Rick," he spoke into his phone, sounding sleepy at first, then clearing his throat and speaking more clearly. "What's...going -- "

"Lucas!!" cried Rick's panicked voice from the other side, "She drank them! I just saw the footage!! We're in deep shit!!"

"What?!" asked Lucas, closing his eyes and shaking his head in the darkness. "What are you talking about, Rick? Who drank what??"

"Your new intern!!" yelled Rick into the phone. "Whatever her name is!! She drank my sample of nanobots that I had in that glass of water on the table when you all came in!! I knew that I hadn't misplaced it! I knew it!! And I went back and looked at the security footage...and...and there she was, drinking it all down!!"

"N-now...now just...just take it easy, ok?" said Lucas, now fully awake. A shot of sickening adrenaline had started his heart thumping, and a cold sweat was beginning to develop on his brow. This was bad...very bad. No animal in the early nanobot trials had managed to survive, and most of them had died quite horribly, their bodies actually exploding. Lucas's mind shot to an image of Brooke's bloody body in some run-down apartment; he quickly tried to shake it away, but doing so wasn't so simple.

"Take it easy!?" exclaimed Rick, almost apoplectic on the other end. "Take it easy!?!? How am I supposed to do that when we've just killed someone!!"

"W-we...we don't...we c-can't be sure, though..." said Lucas, who was already frantically throwing on his clothes. "Maybe...maybe it...uh...are you sure that's what you saw, Rick!?"

"Drop the bullshit and get your ass over here!" Rick shouted. "See for yourself! Oh my god, oh my god...I KNEW that I hadn't forgotten to take that sample out...I just KNEW it...and now...holy shit, she's probably dead alrea--"

"Ok, stop!" said Lucas forcefully, dashing around his bedroom, running into things, stubbing his toes as he got dressed. "No more talk over the phone, you understand? This could all get used against us down the line, ok? So...I'll be over there as soon as I can, alright? Just...just sit tight."

"Make it fast," said Rick, and hung up.

A short while later, Lucas got to the lab. It was early in the morning, just before 5 am. Normally, without coffee, Lucas would be a bleary-eyed mess at this hour, but the serious, horrific, and surreal nature of what was going on ensured that he was wide awake. Lucas's mind was buzzing with all kinds of thoughts whirling and cycloning on each other. How could this have possibly happened!? He knew that Brooke was incompetent and unqualified, but...on her second day!? Managing to drink tens of thousands of nanobots!? It was almost too ridiculous to believe...it would have been funny in a kind of sick way, if the implications weren't so utterly appalling. Why the fuck had Rick left the nanobots out like he did?? In a glass of water!? Surely that was an irresponsible breach of protocol! As he rushed into the lab, Lucas couldn't help feeling aggressively enraged at Rick for being so lax, at Brooke for being so clumsily and ignorantly stupid, and at himself for somehow allowing all this to happen under his watch.

"I turned off the security camera!" reassured an unkempt and wild-eyed Rick when Lucas rushed into his lab office. "Just so...so we can talk...talk freely."

"Ok," said Lucas, breathing heavily as he closed the door. "Ok, so...oh my god...fuck!! Show me the video."

Rick hurriedly did so, and Lucas felt a deep, infuriated antipathy toward Brooke as he watched her pick up the glass, drink it down, and go wash it off. He felt something like sympathy, too, watching the poor girl ingest what was surely going to be her violent death...but he pushed down these feelings of sympathy. Right now, he only had room to feel angry at her, and terrified for himself.

"She's gotta be dead right now," said Rick in a fatalistically dead-pan tone, flopping his arms up in a gesture of futility. "She's dead in her apartment, as we speak. And it wasn't a quiet death, let me tell you. Her body must have -- "

"Ok, ok!!" yelled Lucas, putting up his hand to stop Rick. "I think we both know what the bots do to animals, alright? No need to say it out loud. Ok...so...so what do we do now? Wait to hear about it?"

"We're fucked!" cried Rick energetically, pacing back and forth and rubbing his hands together. "It's gonna get traced back to us, no question. They're gonna put two and two together about this girl getting an internship at a place that does nanobot research...with documented cases of animal testing resulting in said explosion of animals."

"But that's...that's not public knowledge," countered Lucas.

"Yeah, but investigators will find out about it!" replied Rick immediately. "We can't hide those kinds of records from law enforcement! They'll trace it back to us -- easy! And then we're fucked!"

"But...but maybe you can, uh...s-somehow get rid of the security footage!?" asked Lucas, his lips feeling oddly dry.

"Oh yeah, surrrre!" said Rick sarcastically, throwing up his hands. "That'll look GREAT in the deposition, when we say that oh, I don't know...somehow the security footage gets mysteriously scrubbed by some unknown source literally THE DAY that her body explodes. Sure, that'll totally fly with a jury."

"Ok, so...uh...so what else?" asked Lucas, feeling increasingly desperate.

"It's all over," said Rick, the despair in his voice somehow more poignant now that he was speaking softer. "All our research...done. Caput. Finished."

"Y-you...you think?" asked Lucas.

"Oh my god, just think!" exclaimed Rick, looking at him with desperate misery. "The lawsuit that's gonna come crashing down on our heads...Jesus Christ, just imagine it, Lucas! Braden is gonna be wiped off the map!"

Lucas had no response to this -- Rick was right; that's all there was to it. They were all going down...him, Rick, the company that had been his sole foundation for corporate advancement, the research they had all invested their blood, sweat, and tears into...EVERYTHING. It was all totally fucked. He and Rick just stood there for a few silent, awful moments, agonizing over the crazy misfortune that had befallen them.

"I...just...let's just hold on a minute, ok?" said Lucas shakily, moments later, breaking the silence.

"We don't...we don't know...for sure...if anything's happened yet," he continued. "I mean...maybe...maybe we just wait. Wait to see."

"Wait!?" asked Rick ruefully, shaking his head. "I'm not waiting for anything, Lucas. We KNOW what happens with these bots. I think you and I should just...just high-tail it out of there while we still can."

"You mean...go on the run?" asked Lucas, hardly believing what he was hearing.

"I mean, it's better than a jail cell for life!" cried Rick. "That's what we're facing here, Lucas!"

"I know...I...y-yeah, I know," Lucas said, nodding and putting his hands out in a calming gesture. "But...but if we ran now, then...I mean, there'd be NO question of our guilt, you know? That would look extra bad."

Rick looked at him blankly. Lucas knew that he had a point, and he also knew that he was not going to entertain running...at least not just yet.

"So...so I say," he proceeded, "We just...wait. Wait to see, maybe...if she comes in? Who knows? Maybe the bots malfunctioned or...or something. Maybe she's ok. Maybe something happened with them and it's not as bad as we thought."

"Yeah, but Lucas --" began Rick, but Lucas cut him off, using his irritation with Rick's laxity as fuel for his own tone.

"I'm not saying it's probable, alright?" he said, "I'm just saying that we should just...act normal...and see what happens. Alright? We didn't see anything...we don't know anything. We just...carry on as usual...until we hear something about her, ok? Otherwise, it's gonna get traced back to us immediately, and we'll have no defense. We gotta have each others' backs on this, ok, Rick? You hear what I'm saying?"

Rick looked like he was going to keep arguing for a moment, but something in him seemed to suddenly deflate and he gave a great, anxiety-ridden sigh.

"Ok," said Rick. "Just...business as usual...at first. But I'm telling you, Lucas, if the investigators start snooping around here and asking me questions, I'm gone. You understand?"

"I...I get it, Rick, really, I do," said Lucas. "And I'll be right behind you, if it comes to that."

It was an agonizing few hours before Brooke was supposed to come into work. Lucas tried to distract himself by working on this or that, answering emails, getting coffee, pacing up and down in his office, playing random little games on his phone to take his mind off his terrible problem, and so on. But nothing worked, and as 8 o'clock neared, his anxiety reached such a fever pitch that he had to go into the bathroom a few times and splash off his face with cold water. Sophia had poked her head into his office, joking about getting to work before her for once, but Lucas wasn't having any of her games this morning and had snapped at her, telling her to mind her own business.

"Huh, a little touchy this morning, are we?" she inquired, raising her eyebrows and looking at him hard, before retiring to her office. Lucas knew that Sophia must have been aware that something was up, but he just didn't feel like he had the energy to engage her in witty banter.

8 o'clock came and went, and Lucas's anxiety deepened. He was sitting in his leather chair, rotating a few inches to the right, and then to the left, in a halting, nervous cycle. He wasn't even looking distinctly at his computer screen anymore. If Trent or James or whoever had walked into his office and asked him a question, Lucas would have just stared at him blankly, unable to form a response.

8:05...

'She's late because she's late all the time,' thought Lucas to himself, over and over, as the minutes ticked off the clock. 'Brooke couldn't be on time to save her life...'

But that saying got him thinking about the grisly reality of what had probably happened, and he felt sick to his stomach...partially out of sympathy for her, but far more than anything else, out of sympathy for himself and his career, which was in danger of being totally destroyed.

8:10...

He was sure this was it. She wasn't coming in...she wasn't coming in because she was dead. The reality of the situation began to weigh heavily upon Lucas like a lead trench coat, enveloping him deeper and deeper into its crushing embrace. He suddenly, crazily, realized how hard it was going to be to act normal and innocent from now on. His mind flashed to all the crime drama movies and shows he had watched over the years, and how unrealistic it was for the villains to feign their innocence. He was feeling the reality of it all right now...crushing down upon him. He was going to have to make plans...make plans to get away, as fast as he --

A slow, dark movement appeared in Lucas's periphery, in his doorway. He looked up to see Brooke peering awkwardly into his office. His heart stopped. Making eye contact with him and quickly looking down, Brooke proceeded to shuffle into the office, towards the empty chair next to his desk. Lucas followed her with his eyes as she moved, watching her with incredulous and anxious intensity. She sat down in the overly-large chair, heavily put down her work knapsack, and crossed her hands in her lap, clearly waiting to be told what to do. Lucas couldn't do anything except stare -- she looked totally normal. Frumpy, wrinkled clothes, wet hair...the whole shebang. It was...it was just Brooke...sitting there before him...apparently unchanged.

She nervously picked up a nearby newspaper, in an attempt to stave off the awkward silence, and started a crossword puzzle. Lucas turned away towards his computer, pretending to look over his emails, and watched her go over the clues from the corner of his eye. She winced a little to herself and shook her head, clearly struggling with the crossword. Lucas couldn't believe it. She was...okay!

"Well...hello there...Brooke," he said finally, trying to sound official. His voice echoed oddly off the walls. "A, um...a little late again today, I see?" He had meant his voice to sound professionally put-off, but his question came out sounding more searching and anxious than he intended.

"Oh! Y-yeah, I'm...I'm s-sorry!" said Brooke quickly, looking up from the crossword. "It's just...uh, I got...a l-late start this morning."

"I...um...I see," said Lucas, looking over her. He wished he could get the anxiety out of his voice, but at present it was still pumping through his bloodstream.

"So...so you're um, you're feeling ok, though? Not feeling sick or anything?" he asked. He realized that he couldn't afford to sound fishy, so he added: "Because we really don't want anyone coming to work who might be sick. Would compromise the whole office, you know?"

"Yes, oh...oh yes," responded Brooke, nodding vigorously. "I...but, yes, I'm fine. I feel fine."

"Ok...uh...yeah, ok," said Lucas, looking at her closely. For the life of him, he couldn't see anything wrong with her, aside from what was already there. In fact, he even realized, subconsciously, that her overbite was gone. For the first time that morning, his heart began to lift a bit. He turned back to his computer screen, staring at it blankly for a few long moments, before he quickly opened his email and typed a secure, encrypted message to Rick, informing him about the crazy miracle that had just happened. In the meantime, unbeknownst to Lucas, Brooke had abandoned the crossword puzzle and had opened up her laptop, where she started typing in a digital diary that she kept every day. Lucas couldn't see what she was doing -- he was too busy with his email to Rick.

By the time Lucas was done, about ten minutes later, he and Rick had exchanged a series of disbelieving, agitated, and ultimately exhilarating emails. Their mutual concern and worry had quickly turned into excitement as they began to realize the potential business-profit implications of Brooke surviving the dose of nanobots. This is exactly what all those months of animal testing had been geared towards: making the nanobots viable inside of a human host. And now...now it had already been done! And as a total fluke, at that!

'But that's just how these things work in science sometimes!' thought Lucas excitedly to himself as he looked over at Brooke typing in her diary. 'Sometimes, an opportunity just...falls right in your lap...and you have to take advantage of it.'

He took a deep breath. He knew that what he was about to do was ethically (and probably morally) wrong, but he had managed to convince himself that, because he was on the cutting edge of serious scientific advancement, the ends justified the means. And besides, it was just Brooke he was talking about. She should be thankful...and counting herself lucky...to be accidentally involved in such trailblazing research.

"Ok Brooke," said Lucas out loud, turning to her. "Why don't you come with me to the lab?"

"O-ok," she answered, shutting her laptop and bounding up in an ungainly way off the chair. Lucas felt pity for her for a moment, just because of the immediacy of her response. He realized that she totally trusted him...or, at least, didn't really have the capacity not to trust someone in a position of authority. There was something about her innocence, despite her clumsiness, that made Lucas feel bad for her, and bad for how he was using her. But he was able to quickly dismiss these feelings in himself, as he motioned for her to follow him to the lab.

'Gotta stay focused on the ultimate goal,' he reminded himself, gaining confidence and excitement with each step he took toward the lab. On the way, he once again ran into Olivia, who was wearing slightly-higher heels than normal, with a dress that seemed to squish her large breasts together even tighter than usual.

"Oh Lucas!" she trilled, clearly with the intent to halt his stride, "Did you get that email I sent about the coding of the -- "

"Not now, Olivia," interrupted Lucas, putting up his hand as he passed. He was barely able to register Olivia's surprised reaction, and the slight affront that her breasts seemed to express as they bounced up and down suddenly, the result of Olivia's forward progress being halted as she stopped dead in her tracks from the sheer surprise of being so cavalierly brushed-aside. Clearly, she was not used to being addressed this way, especially from the manager of the office who was generally much more receptive to her physical charms. Brooke followed sheepishly in Lucas's wake, obviously not understanding or appreciating the dynamic that was going on. Olivia had time to lock eyes with Brooke and give her a long, hard look as she passed by -- it was like Olivia was trying to search Brooke's demeanor for clues as to why her boss was giving this frumpy new intern such clear preference...over her.

A minute later, Lucas and Brooke were in the lab. Rick was watching the exchange from an adjacent room, having figured (along with Lucas) that having both of them there, grilling Brooke about the new research, might be overwhelming for her. But he was certainly watching intently, waiting with bated breath as Lucas attempted to convince her to sign a consent form that Rick had prepared on the lab table.

"So Brooke," Lucas began, indicating that she should sit down on one of the lab stools (while he, of course, remained standing over her), "I've been looking into some...different roles that you could fill here at Braden. Trust me, haha, there's plenty of different ways we could fit you in, but this morning, just before you came in, I realized something exciting. Wanna know what I thought?"

"S-sure!" said Brooke, her eyes getting a little bigger from anxious excitement.

"Well ok," he continued, making it a point to go slowly as he smiled, "So, how would you feel if we raised your hourly wage...in exchange for you helping us out with a very important job?"

"More...more money?! Uh, haha, ok!" laughed Brooke, blushing.

"Oh yeah," nodded Lucas deliberately. "And I'm talking 20 bucks an hour, Brooke."

"Woah!" she exclaimed.

"Yeahhhh," he said, smiling. "And it's more than just the money, Brooke. It's the nature of the job itself. There's something...historical about it."

Brooke continued to look at him, a bit blankly, even as she continued to timidly smile.

"So about this job," persisted Lucas, feeling like he may as well just go out and say it, "You would be the first human nanobot test subject. How does that sound to you?"

Brooke opened her mouth, but nothing came out. Lucas quickly realized that he should just keep plowing right ahead, and not stop for her reactions.

"Now, not to worry," he continued, "This particular brand of nanobots is our new variety, and totally safe for humans. I mean, think about it, Brooke! You'll be at the forefront of this new cutting-edge technology, you know!? And I'm serious: this nanobot research REALLY has the potential to change humanity for the better...like, full stop, this stuff is gonna be world-changing, you understand? Haha, and just think, all those nice people I introduced you to yesterday, Trent...James, you know? Sophia! This is your chance to really become...part of the team! Oh, and wow...not to even MENTION how this would look on your resume. Haha, it's pretty much a no-brainer, Brooke. But I just, you know...wanted to ask you before I have you sign this consent form here. You know, because I don't wanna force you to do anything. But I just think you should understand...what a big opportunity this is."