The Fledge Effect (5 page)

Trudy didn’t answer. She just checked
her watch, grabbed a book, and headed out to
her porch. Maddie sighed. She realized what
time it was. Her mother always heads outside
the time. She waits, almost every day, outside.
No matter the weather, she was always outside.
“Mom, don’t do this anymore!”
She ignored Maddie’s pleas, slamming
the screen door shut.
Maddie sat next to her. “Why must you
torture yourself?” She waited for a reply. Trudy
opened her book, the same book she has been
reading for eighteen years after Emily left.
“Mom?”
Maddie realized she wasn’t going to get
anywhere with her. She got up, dusted the dirt
off, and left back to her house. Before leaving
Trudy’s yard, she hollered, “I love you.” At that
moment, Trudy waved. That was as good as it
gets when trying to break her trance.
She trekked up her driveway, watching
as the neighbor’s dog ran up to her.
“Max!” a man’s voice said. “Leave the
nice girl alone.”
Maddie looked up.
Oh boy, it’s Steven
Degras,
she thought. Her old high school crush,
wind blowing back his grey T-Shirt, approached
her. She could feel her cheeks flush as he inched
closer.
“Sorry about that, ma’am,” his mannerisms made her melt.
“It is okay, Steven. Cute doggie. What
breed is she?”
“Terrier, poodle mix, or something,” he
chuckled, “Max is my girlfriends’ dog. She is at
work, so I have to dog-sit.”
Maddie looked at her feet. She quietly
sighed, learning he is still taken. His girlfriend,
Theresa, still dangles him along. Yet, anytime
he tries to commit, she backs off him. But, not
so far to make him appear available to anyone.
It placed a fire under Maddie’s belly. But anytime she got up the nerve to do, or say anything,
they were back together once again.
Steven squinted his eyes. “Do I know
you from somewhere?”
She wiped back her bangs from her
eyes. “Yeah, we graduated together. Don’t you
remember?”
“Oh, yeah. Fatty Maddie! How are you?
I almost didn’t recognize you.”
She frowned. “Yeah, no one calls me
that anymore.”
“I can see,” he said, sizing up her new
look. “You had to of lost, what? A hundred
pounds or so.”
“One-fifty-six, to be exact,” she said,
not so proud she ever weighed that much. She is
happy it fell off, but her face would instantly
tighten in embarrassment when she came
across someone who remembered what she
used to look like.
“Huh, it’s a shame, you know?” he said,
hooking the dog back on its leash.
“What do you mean?”
“I liked how you looked. I mean, I could
get used to this, but it’s not
you
.”
Maddie grinned.
Wish you liked me
enough to ever ask me out.
A pink car drove by.
Theresa,
she
thought.
The she-devil
. It honked as she retracted her window. “Sweetie, I got off early.
Come on.”
Steven waved. “Nice seeing you again.”
He jumped in the car. Maddie could
hear her voice say, “
Who was that
?”
The jealous tone in Theresa’s voice
made her smile. She never thought, in a million
years, Miss Perfect would ever be jealous over
her.
“Wow,” she said to herself. “Now, that
right there is an accomplishment.”

Marcel paced his lab, racing his fingers
through his small amount of hair. He mumbled
under his breath, “
How did this happen? I did
everything I was supposed to
.”

He gritted his teeth, grinding them.
Calista gripped the iron bars of her imprisonment and wailed as she failed with her attempt at bending them to free herself. With a
growl in her voice, she hissed, “You couldn’t
have at least cleaned this monkey cage?”
He stumbled back on her request. “Can
you blame me? I was in a hurry. Just pushing it
in my lab raised enough questions from my colleagues. Especially your colleague.”
She gasped, “Emily?”
“Yes and a stubborn woman she is.” He
sighed. “What is with women nowadays? They
are all stubborn-err,
determined,
as you put it.”
Calista moaned, rubbing her neck.
“Aargh! My throat!”
Marcel’s voice became monotonous; as
he eyed the small cooler, he placed next to the
sink and said, “You’re hungry.”
He treaded towards the container,
dragging his heels across the tile floor. Shaking
his head, he bowed to the sight of it. He placed
his palm on the lid. His fingers trembled over
the sliding latch.
This is disgusting,
he knew
what it contained,
but this was the only way to
not be caught.
“What is it?”
Before he could answer, Emily barged
inside his lab. “Where is Calista, and why did
you need a giant cage from the biology department? And, one more thing…” her voice trailed
off as she noticed Calista rocking in the corner
of the cage.
The CBH experiment, from this Project
Fledge… This is a virus.
Emily widened her eyes at the pale
complexion of her best friend. “What the hell,
Marcel?”
He shook his hands, defending himself.
“It is not what it looks like. I can explain!”
“What did you do to her? She is covered
in blood.”
Emily’s frantic escalation raised Marcel’s guard.
“Will you shut my door and shut up?”
realizing the harshness of his words, he added,
“
Please
.”
She pursed her lips, stopping herself
from saying anything else until she finished
closing the door behind her. She watched him
maneuver around the piles of papers. He moved
them briskly with his foot, bending down anytime he found one that he needed. He stacked
them next to the cooler, trembling as he moved
his sight back upon it.
Sensing Emily’s piercing gaze he asked,
“What do you want? Why are you still in my
lab?”
“I want answers.”
“I may be able to help. What is it?”
“Oh, no. I am the one asking the questions here.”
“Then, ask.”
“Does this have anything to do with
that,” she tossed up air quotation marks with
her fingers, “top secret experiment you’ve been
working on?” she dropped her hands and folded
her arms across her chest.
“Project Fledge.”
“Is it?” She began to feel impish with irritation. A simple question, which is all she
wanted, answered. She felt like he was trying
avoiding answering her. He seemed reluctant
to.
He exasperated a sigh, hoping to end
this conversation. He thought of ways to change
the subject off him.
She began tapping her foot inconsistently. “Well?”
He glanced at her stance, noticing her
enlarged mid-section that he had not discovered under the extra fluff her coat provided
from the night before. “How’s the baby?”
She flung her hands into the air, waving
them by her ears. “You are the most irritating
old man I have ever had the displeasure of meeting! Now answer me,
please
,” she said, heaving
a grunt into the air.
“
I’m a displeasure
?” Not one memory
served him to remember any moment in time
to, that of, which she was recalling.
“Yes, don’t you remember Thanksgiving at your house?”
“Oh, that? That was nothing.” He remembered, now, what she was talking about.
He chuckled with fondness. “Yeah, that was a
good time.”
“You threw a dinner roll at me and told
me to fatten up some more.”
He chuckled with lightheartedness as
he examined her stomach, “Well, it looks like it
worked.”
“Heh, now answer me.”
He sighed, impending a rage within
himself. “What was supposed to perfect the human genome turned out to make her the perfect
killing machine.”
Marcel reached inside the cooler and
picked up a rat. “Watch,” he demanded as he
tossed Calista the rodent. Emily winced at the
view of her devouring the thing whole.
“Killing? So she has killed. Like, a
person,
or just those?”
“I believe she killed four people.”
“You’re not sure?” She continued on
her rant, “what did you do wrong,
Marcel
?”
His eyes brightened as he frowned.
“Nothing. I followed my given instructions and
did it exactly how I was told to do it. Maybe I
need to try again. It’s possible I may have misread the secret services’ instructions. I don’t
know.”
Emily breathed, “No.”
“No?”
“You need to reverse its effects, and
now.”
“I can’t. I wasn’t given a reversible formula. Not even a vaccine in case things go
wrong.”
“Well, I’d say things went wrong.”
“Not necessarily. It’s just her that is affected.”
“Well, you need to make one.”
“A cure?”
“Both.”
“I may be able to create a vaccine, but
for what purpose? Who is to say people can contract this? Or if it would even work?”
“Where are the bodies she attacked?
Did you run tests or analysis on them?”
“I left them where I found them.”
“How many were there?”
“Four. Three in the street, and one in an
apartment on Ridgefield Drive. But, the three
bodies disappeared when I brought her back to
my lab.”
“The apartment? What floor?”
“Third. Why?”
“I know someone there. I have to leave,
now,” she said, grabbing her keys from her
pocket.
“I’m coming with you,” he announced
as he swung his coat over his shoulders.
“You don’t need to. I can take care of it
myself,” her ways were dead set, but Marcel refused to allow any harm to be done to her.
“I’m coming, rather you want me to or
not.” The look in his eyes screamed crazy. The
one thing she didn’t want to do was
poke the
beast
.
“Well, I don’t want you to.”
“Too bad, my coat is already on,” he
said, lifting his chin.
She couldn’t help but stop him. “What
about Calista?”
He watched as she sat in the cage, burrowed deep into a corner. “Eh, she’ll be fine.”
Emily shook her head, locking his door.
“Well, until then, no one will have access in here
but us. No need for people to overreact as to why
we have a person trapped in a cage.”
He laughed. “No kidding. As a scientist,
we already have a bad enough rap from those
liberal, hippies, brats. They constantly accuse us
of testing products on living beings.”
She paused, squinting her face. “But,
don’t we?”
He threw his hand down into the air, as
if he were karate chopping a board. “Yes, but
that is not the point.”
She sighed a small, stifled, laugh as she
followed him to his car. The smell of stale fries
incubated under the beaming sun. Under her
feet were half-eaten burgers, and several dozen
empty coffee containers. She grimaced, looking
in the back seat. Old clothes, that smelled with
a rotting stench of body odor laid out across the
entire back seat. “Ugh. Do you live in your car?”
He shrugged. “Don’t like it, get out.”
Her seatbelt was already fastened
across her chest. “I’m good. Just crack a window, will you?”
He was unique, to her. Almost fatherlike. Even through all of the bickering, she still
looked up to him in a way a daughter should
look up to her father. She lacked one in her life,
making it hard for her to determine how she
should
act around him. She didn’t want him to
feel awkward around her. But, somehow, sometimes, she felt he knew it too. She honestly
thinks that is why he trusts her enough to only
inform her on things that are of a need to know
basis.
His hair, grey with age, wisped in the
wind as the car moved steadfast. His face,
creased with age, matched his aging hands.
Emily saw the wisdom in his eyes, from living a
long life, but she could sense a darkness about
them. A regret of some sort.
Unable to decipher his emotionless
gaze, she focused on her one mission: to remove
any traces of evidence Calista may have left behind.
They grew up together, and the last
thing Emily wanted to see was her best friend to
sit in a jail cell.
It’s bad enough she has to be in
that damn cage
, she thought. She knew it was
probably for the best, but denied it should be
deemed as such.
Calista, by nature, was a sweet girl
growing up. Even God knew she lacked the nurture from her neurotic workaholic parents.
Even then, she was still able to show, and feel, a
sense of lovingness to those who didn’t even deserve it.
Emily was unable to wrap her mind
around Calista as a killer.
“How sure are you that this person is
dead?” She was convinced he was wrong. There
was no doubt that his age could have affected
his ability to tell the living from the dying.
“He didn’t have a pulse when I left. I
don’t know for sure. But I do know he was unresponsive.”
“Hmmm.”
Her accusation became clear to him. In
his experience with her, he understood when
she disbelieved him. He knew she would never
say it aloud. The piercing look she shot at him
said it louder than any set of words she could
string together.
“Look, I know for a fact, that a person is
dead when their heart stops beating. Plain and
simple. No heart equals no life,” he paused, quieting his tone as he continued, “at least, not a
life I would enjoy living.”
“What? You haven’t enjoyed the long
life you were given so far?” She was presumptuous, but needed to know how living a rich life
could be consequential.
In school, she would always borrow
Calista’s good clothes. They were made professionally and not by the hand of an old maid. It’s
not that she was poor, but the fact that the cost
of living outweighed the money spent by her
mother on venues, depleted her chance at ever
wearing anything name brand.
He sighed, hesitant. “Not lately…” He
seemed to of dazed off in a trance. His eyes were
lost in deep thought. She knew this, and kept
her mouth shut for the remainder of the drive
up from Wyllys Avenue, headed North West towards Ridgefield Drive.
•••
Jack rested his chin on the heel of his palm,
pushing aside yet another stack of papers. He
sipped the last drop of his coffee as his eyes began to weigh down. He jumped as Brinks rose
from her chair. Her eyes were bright, and without a single dose of caffeine, she was still able to
appear well kept and wide-awake. He didn’t
know how she did it.
Must not have any kids.
He chuckled at his own thought.
“I have to make a quick phone call.
Don’t move, and keep working.”
He rolled his eyes. “Well, which is it?
Don’t move, or keep working?”
She glared at him with wide eyes.
“Okay,” he breathed, waiting for her to
leave, “Obviously not a single funny bone resides in that woman.”
He tapped the end of blue ink pen on
the wooden surface of her desk. Whistling a
tune, he examined her office. Plaques, awards,
and a few sports trophies covered the entire
back wall behind her desk.
Impressive
, he
thought, continuing with his gaze towards the
wall next to him.
Above his head was a diploma from one
of the Country’s most prestigious colleges.
“Okay, now she’s just showing off.” A four-digit
year, from when she supposedly graduated,
however, caught him off guard. Where it should
have read: 1988, it read 1898. He shook his
head. “For a high-end, sophisticated school,
they sure don’t know how to proofread.”
Getting bored with her two other bare
walls; he decided to focus on the items upon her
desk. Not much to look at. Just the average pencil sharpener, calendar, and penholder. But,
something new appeared. Left in plain sight. It
seemed to have been accidently forgotten by
Brinks.
Her keys
, he thought.
He sidled up around her desk, careful to
watch the door behind him. He ran his fingers
along the edge of the desk, and in a sly motion,
he swept up the keys.
A tiny brass key, significantly different
from the rest, found place between two of his
fingers. He slid it into the keyhole on the locked
drawer. He turned it, and to his amazement, it
unlocked. She wouldn’t normally leave such accessible items just lying around, but his curiosity punched through his integrity when the
drawer slid a half-inch open on its own. “I’m
taking that as a sign,” he said with a smile.
He pulled it open, revealing an empty
space. Recalling from a previous experience, he
popped the fake bottom out. Under the thinned,
wooden, slab was a manila envelope. Standard
size for an office-related work file. However,
typically, they are stamped and addressed. This
envelope had only two words scribbled across
the center: PROJECT FLEDGE, in neat, legible,
print.
He opened it, noticing it wasn’t sealed.
A small stack of papers was stapled together. He
read them, and after a few minutes, the office
door opened. He didn’t waiver in movement as
Brinks walked through the door with such an elegant manner.
She folded her arms across her chest.
She tapped her foot, and realized he wasn’t
planning to speak first.
“Haven’t you ever heard the phrase,
‘
curiosity killed the cat’
?”
He narrowed his eyes on her. “What the
hell is this?”
“Oh, so you do have interests!” She
grinned with a menace. She smirked, “Nosey
bastard.”
“Answer me!” he demanded.
She stomped towards him, and with a
huff, she threw the papers back into her drawer.
She locked it, placing her keys back into her
pocket. “It is none of your concern.” Her voice
was cold, almost slicing.
“What is the CBH virus? It said it was
only experimental. For what, though?” He could
feel his fists begin to shake. The overwhelming
urge to punch something, set him off further.
“Are you planning on wiping out an entire nation?”
She threw her head back, cackling. “Oh,
don’t be ridiculous! No. It is more like, I’m trying to help people.”
“
Help people with a virus
?” he said,
keeping his tone level, and lowered. He didn’t
know if anyone else knew. He felt his job was already on the line learning this new information.
However, he found it to be a nonsense of lies.