“Insincerity”
“Part 8, Imposition”
Author: It_that_watches
“Yeah, it’s uh… it’s me.”
Matthew paused to look with concern upon the frightened intern.
“You alright kid? You look like you just stepped into a lion’s den- they’re just fluffies. I… can all but guarantee these ones don’t bite.”
“NN-No, sir, it’s not that. I-I love working with the fluffies here.”
Matthew responded with a sickening lilt of concern.
“What is it then son?” He cut him off before he even had a chance to think of a response, “Ah… I know what it is. You… also can’t bear to see them like this, can you. To see them in pain I mean. You’ve got that air about you; I can tell by the look in your eyes that you’ve got a good heart.”
He sauntered over to the fluffies, no longer making any effort to hide the damage that years of working in this metal hell had done to him. He fell uneasily to his knees, half-startling the fluffies awake with the sound of the impact, and the jangling of suspended tools. He opened his lab coat, withdrew a canvassed set of medical instruments, and went about giving them a checkup.
Nathan stood in disbelief at what he was seeing. This was the dreaded Dr. Winston he’d been told so much about? This… kindly looking old man so gently caring for fluffies he knew were soon to die? Something had to be up- there had to be a catch. Either he was an expert at hiding his callous disregard for life, or he’d been severely misinformed on who Dr. Winston truly was.
“Could you give me a hand?”
Nathan snapped out of his trance.
“What? What was that?”
Matthew chuckled softly.
“I only asked if you could give me a hand, son. There’s… something I do in cases like these. It is a heavy weight though- I’ll understand if you don’t want to shoulder it.”
“What… are you going to do?”
“I going to take them to a place where they can pass peacefully. Away from all this hustle and bustle.”
The ears of the deteriorating fluffies twitched nervously at every little sound. Clearly, this was not their happy place. But then again was it anyone’s?
Working with wordless speed and efficiency, Nathan helped Dr. Winston carry one of the fluffies as they ventured away from what was most likely the only room that they had ever known.
They shivered in the cold lab air and cowered from the harsh light, until eventually, Matthew reached a service elevator somewhat out of the way of the production floor. The grates closed as the lift began to descend.
“Erhm… Dr. Winston… I don’t think I’m supposed to be wherever it is we’re going. I only have clearance to be up on the production and incubation floors.” Moments passed in silence as his anticipation grew. “Where is it that we are going?”
Matthew spoke with atonal emotionlessness, before assuming a reassuring voice…
“The old incinerator room. It should be fine. Nobody’s supposed to be down here.”
He seemed so calm saying that. The old incinerator room. He spoke of it like he were talking about going to the bathroom.
“P-Pardon? Sir? I- You said we were taking them somewhere…”
“Peacefully. Yes.”
The warmth of the active furnaces in the second sub-basement could be felt even as the lift had just come to a stop, even as the scissor-doors slid open.
“You’re new here, that’s obvious. You’re young, bright-eyed… and you care. At least you seem to care.” Matthew looked down the foreboding dark hallway that seemed to breath it’s heat upon them and continued to walk as he spoke. “This floor has an abandoned habitat down here, near the incinerator. The mass production structures were built on top of all this. This is where we used to work.”
He watched as Nathan passed him by and took a nondescript door by the sliding handle.
“No, not… not the actual room. Not yet. They still have a bit of time, and they’re well… alive. That would be unjustly cruel.”
He made a mental note though. That door was not labelled; someone had removed the labelling earlier during relocation. Yet this kid still knew where the room was deep in this groaning steel maze, despite supposedly never being here. His suspicions, and excitement, grew.
“Follow me son. There is a much better place.”
The room was uncomfortably close to the incinerator. Were they really raised so close to where they died?
“This door, could you open it for me? I would but… Ahah… I’m getting old.”
Nathan looked back at him to be met with a warm, weary smile, and a gentle “cooing” from the fluffy he held.
The door scraped open, and the lights flickered to life.
The room was… Cozy. Heated by the fires of the nearby furnaces, the room was not cold and clinical; much more pleasant in fact than the room they were picked up from. The age-mottled padded walls were accentuated with smiling cartoon stars- glowing within the bath of light from the old incandescent bulbs.
“Here we are… Your new home.”
With practiced efficiency he produced two syringes from his coat, flicked off the protective cover off of one, and jabbed the fluffy in the chest.
“Can you set down the other one?”
“Owie… Nu wike pinchy feews.”
“Oh, I’m sorry Bob, it was just to help you wake up! How do you like your new home?”
Nathan moved to gently set the other fluffy beside “Bob”, and as soon as it was set down, the second syringe met its mark.
“Owie! Nu wike!”
“So sorry Sam, I just want to play with you for a bit!”
Both fluffies started to wake from their hazy slumber, and slowly began to piece together what they had just heard. They didn’t recognize the names they’d just been called. Were they… was this nice mister…
“Am fwuffy namsies Bob? Am yu… am yu new daddeh?”
“New daddeh fow… fow Sam?”
Matthew closed his eyes for a brief moment, a frozen sliver of time that seemed to last forever for the two hopeful fluffies.
“Yes. I’m your new daddy.” There was another pause as their mouths dropped open in disbelief. “I love you both very much, and this is your new house. Do you want to play?”
They shouted in unison, their tired voices now so suddenly awake.
“DADDEH! WUV DADDEH!”
“Daddy… Daddy loves you too.”
“Yaaayyy!”
The fluffies turned on their creaking heels to play with one another squealing and cheering in overwhelming happiness. They had found a daddy! A daddy had found them! And what’s more, for the first time in a forever, they were filled with energy.
“What… What did you give them Dr. Winston?”
After a bit of side-eye, he posited a question-
“Can you keep a secret?”
Without much thought Nathan responded.
“Yeah?”
Nathan leaned closer as the tumbling fluffies rolled around and bumped into his leg.
“Well…” Matthew responded, “So can I.”
The crack-hiss noise of Matthew opening a Pepsi was lost somewhere in the padded walls and unwell groaning of distant, overused pipes. Nathan did not look impressed, but he did look a bit concerned. He sipped the drink with heavy eyes and great indifference. Occasionally he’d look down at the tumbling fluffies and rile them back into their energetic ruckus.
“Ahh, you’re implicated I suppose it doesn’t matter if I tell you… It’s mostly just meth. Methamphetamine and ephedrine.”
Nathan wasn’t quite sure to make of what he’d just heard. Obviously, he’d misheard the good Doctor.
“Pardon Dr. Winston?”
“I mean, there’s saline in there too, I didn’t just shoot them up with speed and synthetic adrenaline.” He took another sip as he ruffled Sam’s patchy mane. “I think I’ve gotten the dosage about right over the first couple… dozen… times I’ve done this. Of course, each case is different, but they all deserve their ‘happiest day’, don’t you think?”
His jaw slackened open, and his voice lowered to a hiss.
“What in the living- what is wrong with you Dr. Winston!? You can’t just… Where did you even get…”
“I made it.”
Matthew bent down and picked up Bob, swishing him around just above the floor. “Zoom, zoom! Wuv gu fas’!”
Sam chuckled in shared amusement, yelling “Zoom!” and chasing his friend around the padded portion of the room.
“YOU MADE IT!?”
“Hey.” Matthew replied in a firm voice, “Calm down you’re scaring the fluffies.”
He released Bob, who joined Sam in cowering behind Matthew’s legs. They trembled like leaves under an uncertain wind, their whimpering just as quiet and wavering.
“Nu wike wowd noiseies… huwt Bob heawie pwaces…”
“P-p-pwease nu haf’ maddies! Fwuffies am gud! Nu du anyfink nu-gud!”
“You… how- what- when… where… why?”
Nathan backed off, now uncertain if Dr. Winston were a misunderstood senior scientist, or crazed drug dealer. Perhaps he was both.
“Well…” Matthew began, first kneeling to comfort his new charges, “I’ve been working in a biological research facility for many years and have a pharmaceutical background, so that’s how I had the wherewithal to do it. I’ve already told you what was in the syringes, mostly meth and ephedrine… I stole the ephedrine and saline from production- obviously it’s easier to get your hands on that kind of thing, we do have a room full of the stuff. Obviously, I couldn’t just use Adderall for the amphetamine component, it’s not concentrated enough, and the substance is too controlled…”
“Daddeh? Am yu fwiend otay?”
“Bob am haf’ scawdies…”
“As for the when… I made a bunch a while back, you’ll have to forgive me- I don’t remember when precisely… the meth I mean, not the mixture, it’s not very shelf stable… Uhhh… Where? Well, there are labs down here we don’t use, and since I didn’t blow anything up when I used it, I’d say I did a pretty good job… this batch I just made in out the open, in Chem-Lab 61 over in Department D. Didn’t even bother to hide it.” He scoffed with an air of slightly worried disbelief at the circumstances. “Nobody questions anything I do around here anymore. They see the red lining on my lab coat and try to forget they saw anything at all. And as for why… because Sam and Bob deserve a happy day! Yes, they do! You two deserve all the best things!”
He pulled them up his knees to his chest and into a warm, fluffy hug.
“You know… before…”
His neck twitched to an infinitesimal degree.
“But let’s not talk about that! My friend here is a great friend, and he loves fluffies! He wants you to have the best day ever!”
Their eyes lit up as they wistfully looked up at Nathan.
“Nu fwend?”
“Uh… Yeah, I’m…” he cautiously looked to Matthew for approval, and when he received warm a smile in return… “Yeah! I’m here to be your friend! What do you want to play?”
Elation.
Hours passed as the two fluffies bumbled around the early-build fluffy-proof room, joyfully squealing and laughing the time away. Nathan spoke to Dr. Winston about work, philosophy, and sparingly, family. This is exactly what he needed to have happen. The fluffies had begun to expend their energy, and with it, they were falling back into their previously found state of rest. This time, deeper.
“So, what brought you to work at Hasbio? You seem like a good enough kid, better than to get tangled up in all… this.”
Nathan looked up at him through long brown bangs, head slightly lowered.
“Well, Dr. Winston to be honest I could ask you the same question. You seem to have a genuine affection for the proto… I mean, fluffies, sorry- all the other staff here just beat that into you. You know the whole spiel ‘When you’re on the clock you are to behave professionally. These are products, not pets; Stop treating them like you would an animal.’ Gah, it’s enough to make you sick.”
Matthew made a show of looking away.
“Dr. Winston?”
“Kid, there’s a reason for all of that. And… it’s a da-” he tilted his head towards toward the fluffpile of two, ears perked up with approaching concern, “Auhh… Darn good reason.” The fluffies relaxed, glad that there would be no meanie-words today. “I good reason for that, Nathan.”
His tone darkened.
“Do you know how fluffies came to be living out there in the wild?”
“Well, yeah, everyone does. There was a terrorist attack on this facility, right?”
“Yeah. There was. And they inadvertently released a biological weapon.”
Nathan craned his head as sarcastically as his neck would allow.
“You can’t possibly mean the fluffies, right? You alright in the head old man? I mean, look at them!” He gestured softly at the sleepy fluffies and flashed a smile that they quickly returned. “Really, I mean I just don’t understand. Are you gonna sit there and tell me that they don’t deserve to be free?”
“No, no, of course not… I’m gonna tell you that those specific prototypes were not prepared for freedom. The world would be a better place, if not by much if they never made it out of the facility.”
Nathan opened his mouth to object but wasn’t given the chance.
“Those poor little things… They were robbed from their cribs. They were still learning, still growing, we still had so much to give them and now…”
Matthew’s head hung low.
“I see pieces of them scattered by roadsides. I see whole families suffering in cardboard boxes. I see evidence of them on the news, destroying crops, jamming up machine intakes, just… dying in ways you wouldn’t have thought possible. It seems like the universe wants them dead… but that’s not true. Their programming was incomplete. They see the world as a big bright happy place full of sunshine and hugs… because that’s what we programmed into them first. That’s what the investors and stockholders needed to see.”
He flipped over the Pepsi can above his mouth, collecting what droplets remained, before shoving the can into a pocket. From the same pocket, he produced another can.
He turned quickly towards Nathan, an air of desperation and sorrow beginning to cloud his features. Deep in his eyes welled up to sorrow of a broken, beaten man.
There was no need to pretend anymore.
“We were going to make them better Nathan. We- we just needed time! I know it sounds cruel, but the actual next thing on the docket was to teach them fear! They needed to know… they need to know… how full of hate the world is.”
CRACK-HISS
“And I don’t just mean humanity. The Earth is full of hate, oh yes, and all the creatures that live upon her only do so because they have her blessing- a blessing that fluffies do not have. And shut up for a second, because I know what your next line was- ‘Fluffies are just as alive as any other animal! They have just as much a right to exist as natural life!’ wasn’t it?”
Nathan closed his mouth and lowered his raised index finger. He was about to say something like that.
“Yeah. They were not ready for what lay out there in the gloaming wildwoods of the world… Every living thing out there has been forged in the crucible of evolution for uncountable generations. Fluffies were made in three and a half years. I mean this quite literally when I say that the outside world will eat them alive. I’ve… I’ve seen it happen. I uhm, live in a forest… We have coyotes.”
Sam and Bob began to nod off.
“Anyway…” he said, shaking his free hand dismissively, “That’s not important. We were trying to create life, in this terrible place… and we were close to doing it too, but when that back door opened, and the intruders rushed in we were out of time. We failed. Now you see why so many people call them abominations… they are. And, while it was immoral to create those things, the same people would readily tell you that it’s also immoral to put that life down. and… they’re right. On both counts. Fluffies were supposed to be better, but they had their chance at a good life stolen by overzealous idiots that just couldn’t wait.”
He sighed heavily.
“They were never meant to breed outside of these labs, Nathan. And even if they were, they were supposed to have had their genomes ‘set’ so that they wouldn’t wildly evolve out of control. But as you know, they do… and they did… and now we have ferals to deal with. Whole herds of little lives just as happy to see to sun each day as you or I! Well… Maybe just you… I…”
He shook his head solemnly.
“They’re out there, kid. Making families. Building homes. Shaping communities… and having it all taken away by a hungry flock of birds. Or a fox. Or a bored kid. Or hell, even just a day of unusually heavy rain.”
He checked that Sam and Bob had fallen asleep. They had. His words could not reach them.
“Winter, Nathan. They can live out a whole life cycle in one year, and none of ‘em ever see it coming… The sky darkens, the days get shorter, and… they freeze. They sleep in snow… and when you sleep in snow… you never wake up. We created suffering, kid. Not life. You look in a Seattle alleyway and tell me anything in there is doing more than just barely surviving.”
“Well, sir… most fluffies are well taken care of. They live indoors with loving families and get to experience life to its fullest, so what about them?”
“Kid. You severely miscalculate how many fluffies live in comfort. Sure, some are pampered; perhaps they grow up in a loving household with food and care and love aplenty… But just as many as live that happy life never see the light of day. They come out of a vending machine- and I swear, if I catch whoever came up with that idea, I’m gonna kill them- er, uh… they… they come out of a vending machine, or cheap back alley dealer’s pickup truck, enter a basement, and live under the direction of a cruel uncaring man-child playing god that flays them alive for the slightest misstep, or even no misstep at all. Does their absolute AGONY justify the contentment that the lesser feel?”
“I… highly doubt that Dr. Winston. I’m sure more live peacefully than fall prey to abus-“
“Fall prey to humanity?”
“You… have a very low opinion of humankind, don’t you.”
“You could say that, yeah. I’ve seen some shit. You ever been inside a fluffy-mill? I got to go along with corpo-sec for a raid once to perform genetic baselining on their stock, you know to see just how bad the operation had gotten, and just how much they probably corrupted the local genepool.”
He took what could only ostensibly be described as a drag from the blue can he held, and continued with a bitter look that did not match the taste.
“One of the breeding mares had two heads, three forearms on one side, diplopia in the right eye of the left head, and a backwards leg joint on the rear right leg. That image is burned into my mind. The thing was only capable of gasping in pain- they cut out it’s tongue and cut it’s vocal cords so it would stop screaming… You wanna know why they did all this shit?”
Nathan was beginning to look sick.
“Profit, of course… She was an alicorn.”
He turned to make eye contact. Nathan turned to avoid it.
“I was charged with returning the worst examples to HQ for stem-harvesting and possible vivisection if the mutations warranted it… those poor fluffies… none of ‘em ever made it back. They all died tragically from a lethal dose of fentanyl someone put in the saline. Sadly, we never caught who did it… the killer is still out there. Stem-harvesting is always enough, there is absolutely no need to vivisect them to understand the mutations… our goal is to cleanse the gene pool, not speculate on it.”
The can was nearly empty.
“The wilds are only marginally better. Yesterday I saw a defective fluffy freezing and starving alone out in a pit in the forest, where the roots of an upturned tree used to be. It’s tragic. There’s a herd somewhere nearby my house. I know because sometimes they show up on my property. This little pink one… it had been trapped by another animal and was being used as some sort of stress toy. Pinned and crying. There are so many pitfalls out there in the woods. So many are filled with fluffies rejected from herds. Browns and greens, tossed in, and left to die. I… I try to give them comfort, but there’s only so much I can do.”
He finished with the second can and pocked it. His eyes flickered to the intern’s nametag.
“The best we can do, Nathan, is to ensure that NOTHING leaves this facility until it’s ready to. We only release prepared, genetically stable fluffies to either accredited retailers on the lookout for abusers, or we sell directly to the prospective adoptive family. Fluffies leaving here unprepared, unset, or unfinished will only hurt them. If they escape into the wild, the problem is infinitely worse.”
Nathan was beginning to fidget in his chair.
“H-how so?”
“If they breed out there in the wild, they create a ‘corrupted bloodline’ that perpetuates potentially forever. This act of instinct literally creates infinite suffering. They think having foals will make them happy, but all it does is add more fuel to the fire. Kids die, parents suffer. Parent’s die, kids suffer and then die. Kids live? Kids suffer long enough to have more kids. Cycle repeats like a fuzzy ouroboros.”
Nathan was beginning to sweat, and it wasn’t from the furnaces nearby. High above them, the skies grew restless. There is a sound of thunder.
“Losing your nerve kid? We still have one last service to perform for little Sam and Bob.”
He gulped back his reservations. His mind raced.
“R-right I-I’l help you bring them back to-”
“They’re dead, Nathan.”
The two still warm fluffies, appearing to peacefully sleep had no pulse of life within them. Whether from degradation or overdose, they had passed, but not before experiencing affection for the first time in their lives.
“Nathan…” Matthew said, blocking the way back to the service elevator, “Could you open the door to the incinerator room? I know you know where it is.”
He froze in place. Pulse pounding.
“Nobody will ever know, kid. Nobody but me.”
He slammed the lever down, and the door creaked open.
“You and your cohorts.”
Nathan was halfweay through the austere room before turning back at the accusation.
“There’s no point in hiding it son. I know you’ve been helping fluffies escape. I don’t blame you. You didn’t know the whole story. I’m assuming Harriet poisoned you against the company. Against all fluffykind.”
He stepped closer.
“I need to know what you know. To save them. You know Dave Miller, Dep-C security chief?”
“N-not particularly…”
“He’s the guy at Gate-D01 in the security booth that flags you in for the day when you check in. He’s usually watching true-crime stuff or playing DbD. That guy?”
“I-I know of him… wait, he does what? DvD’s?”
“Unimportant. What matters is that even with his access to every security recording for the past year I’ve not been able to pinpoint where the hell the fluffies keep escaping from. But I know, and you know, that you know. So just… Just help me help the fluffies. First though…”
Matthew approached the great furnace gates, and pulled down a large lever, heavy with rust and age. A massive metal maw filled with howling fire opened, turning the room from a sauna into a sweltering inferno.
“Goodnight, little Bob. May you find more peace in the next world than you found in this one.”
The fire screamed higher as it engulfed the deceased creature, a weary smile still on his face until the moment the heat atomized his remains.
“Now… Hand me Sam.”
Unable to speak, Nathan complied. The heat was becoming unbearable, but he couldn’t help but watch in awe as Dr. Winston gazed into jaws of hell, hair and clothing blowing back in the updraft. He passed the small body to Matthew.
“Goodnight, Sam. You will be remembered, for as long as my mind and this steel goliath stands.”
Sam spun end over end as he became as a falling star, flashing bright as the depths of the heat turned him to ash. Matthew reached his hand out to the access lever, and after a few more seconds of staring into the uncaring fire, he slammed it down. The empyreal gate closed.
He moved silently to a broken extinguisher case on the wall, and reached inside.
He raised withdrew a crash-axe and raised it above his head.
CLANG-SCRREEEEEEEEEEEEECH
He brought it down again upon the furnace door.
CLANG-SCRREEEEEEEEEEEEECH
As his eyes adjusted, he could see hundreds of similar lines of rust clearly removed by this same axe. Matthew placed it back in its case. Nathan, on the verge of tears spoke over the low rumble of the mournful flames below.
“Why… Dr. Winston… Why… why do you name them?”
“To carry the weight of their deaths on my shoulders. To remind me of the weight that I carry with every little life, and the price of the failures I have made to protect them. Rest now, Sam and Bob. Your fight is over.”
“It’s… It’s a pulley system.”
Matthew turned to Nathan, the poor kid now on his knees against the hot metal floor.
“What?”
His hands covered his face in shame, until he extended one trembling arm towards the left side of the room.
“The incinerator chutes at the airgaps… She… she set up a system… I don’t know how, but fluffies brought down here… They’re put in carriers and brought up the wire to the trash input outside the building. Those late-night trucks aren’t… aren’t dumping trash. They’re onboarding fluffies.”
Matthew stepped slowly over to the chute access, and pushed it open. It was too dark to see, but reaching out… he felt a chain. And a locking-hook. This had to be it.
“Kid… Nathan…” Matthew responded, moving over to him and wrapping him in a reassuring hug. “You’ve done more good than you know. You’ve saved countless little lives. Millions of little smiles and loving families will be made from this discovery.”
He released the intern from his arms. His part in this was over.
“I’ll call corporate and tell them you were injured on the job. Take a week off to recoup. I’ll… I’ll handle things from here. Paperwork and all. We can still fix this kid. You did good*.*”
He smiled as he helped Nathan to his feet.
“I think actually that you might deserve a junior position here. It’s rare I actually meet someone with integrity. You were misguided by a bad actor, but you tried to do the right thing. Let’s head back to the service lift. Here…” Matthew helped him to his feet, propping him up him up arm over shoulder. “Let’s get you out of here."
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