After
weeks of searching for the perfect test subject, I found myself in the most unlikely
of places: a college bar. My subject was drunk, exuberant, and beautiful. I
knew instantly he was the one I wanted for my research. There’s nothing like a
perfect face, and seeing one damaged is one of the universe’s cruel jokes. My
goal is to ensure that no attractive person has to live with scars or burns
ever again.
It
didn’t take long to get my beautiful gentleman out of the bar and into my lab.
He was intoxicated, open to suggestion, and easy to pull away from his friends.
A few rounds of cheap liquor sent their way, and they were none the wiser.
##
I had
my assistant meet me at the lab and she barely complained about the late hour.
She has a mouth on her sometimes but she’s excellent at organizing samples, and
she’s only working for me for college credit, so what can you do?
“Maria,
please, set Subject A up for the first round of treatments. Then, bring me my
equipment.”
“Right
boss,” Maria agreed, snapping her gum. I hate when she does that. It undermines
the importance of everything I do.
I donned
my pristine, white lab coat, affixed my goggles to my face, and entered the lab
with what I felt to be an appropriate air of drama about me. I was going to
make history here tonight. Maria had yet to put on her lab coat and had gotten
distracted with her smart phone halfway through strapping down the subject.
“Maria!”
I barked, instantly outraged that she was once again ruining the atmosphere
I’d tried so hard to set up. “You’ve barely started! Where are my tools? My
needles? My compounds! My lightning?”
Maria
held up her finger for silence, snapped her gum, and went back to her phone to
thumb in a few more clicking sentences, before looking up as if she’d just
realized I was there.
“You
ready boss?”
“I am
not ready! There isn’t a drop of rain outside! I don’t see a single bubbling
beaker. And why haven’t you brought me what I’ve asked for?”
“Hey,”
Subject A slurred. “You said there’d be appletinis.”
“And
you haven’t sedated the subject!” I was livid, trying my hardest to control my
temper. Things went awry when my temper flared. Maria wouldn’t like me when I
was in the midst of a tantrum.
“Cool
your jets, boss, I got this.” Tucking her phone into the pocket of her
jeans—jeans! In my lab!—Maria worked her magic, strapping the subject down to
the table, before grabbing for the anesthesia, giving an enthusiastic thumbs up
as she turned back toward the lab table.
Rather
than waiting for her to finish and then go get my materials, I made my
way into the supply room, grumbling loudly about Maria’s insubordination as I
passed by. She said nothing.
Four
injections later, I stared down at my beautiful subject. He was bloody, marred
hideously where I’d applied my tools. Maria stood by, taking notes diligently
as I worked.
“Now
we wait,” I said, setting my scalpel down carefully to steeple my fingers
beneath my nostrils. Maria kept scribbling for a moment before turning back to
the subject, her gaze lazy as if the entire process bored her. She snapped her
gum again. “Would you stop that?”
She
just shrugged, turning to spit the gum with expert aim into the biohazard waste
bin. I glowered her way for a moment but quickly turned my attention back to
Subject A. He would be beautiful once again, oh yes.
“Get
ready,” I murmured, sure that my calculations had been correct. “Any moment.”
“Sure
thing, boss.”
I got
into mad science for love of the craft. Of course, some get into it for the
wrong reasons: world domination, money, love of another human being that they
refuse to let die and wish to bring back in a different body or perhaps as an
amalgamation of many different bodies. Not I. I came into this with goals and
dreams of helping people.
Beautiful
people, but perhaps one day ugly people could benefit from my work as well. If
they ask nicely enough or could pay me enough money. I need to fund my research.
There
was a twitch beneath Subject A’s right cheek, just below where I’d cut him. I
gasped, glee filling me like liquid into a test tube. Maria poised pen over
notepad, her expression changing slightly as if she might actually be invested
for once. Mucus pooled, just as my calculations had predicted, seeping from the
subject’s pores to overtake the wound. Covered in yellowish ooze, the skin
began to knit itself together at an impressive pace, exactly as I had intended.
I let out a small squeal of excitement,
clearing my throat instantly in an attempt to tamp it out. Maria glanced my way
and made notes, probably about my unprofessional reaction.
I
would edit that part out later.
“Uh,
boss.” I glanced at Maria, irritated that her tone was anything less than
ecstatic. “Might want to come see this one.”
I
hustled around the table, bumping Maria out of the way to lean in and adjust
the magnification on my goggles to inspect the bruised laceration at Subject
A’s left hip. The mucus was reproducing at an alarming rate, rebuilding the
skin much faster then necessary.
“Rats,”
I mumbled.
“I
thought you wanted to get straight to human testing. I can hit the pet store in
the morning, though,” Maria commented from my left. I waved her off, leaning
back slightly when the mucus spurted up to splatter my goggles.
“I’m
going to need to recalculate. Roll the subject into the recovery room,” I
ordered, trying to see toward the sink through the thick droplets clouding my
vision.
“He’s
healed at least,” Maria said, poking a gloved hand into the knot of fresh flesh
my compound had produced where there had previously been only the split skin
and bloody bruises left after I’d hit my subject with a baseball bat for
science.
##
Weeks
later, I had positioned my lab table outside the recovery room, peering in
through the glass at Subject A as he attempted to fight against the chain
keeping him from wandering too far from his bed, as well as against his own
newly gained weight. It was hard to see through the layers of greenish,
yellowish mucus that had formed along his skin, but he’d gained an outer shell
of excess flesh. Maria had reported that the skin was tough, nearly impossible
to penetrate, even with the sharpest of blades. I had done my job too well.
But
Subject A was still beautiful, in his own thick, knobby, malformed way.
“Calm
down,” I cooed comfortingly through the narrow opening into which we slid his
round of supplements twice daily. “You’re still handsome, still a catch!” I
pressed my hand against the glass, smiling. I was losing my professional edge.
I should have moved on to gather other subjects, but A held all my interest.
“I’m
done for the day, boss,” Maria said from the doorway to the lab. “You need
anything else?”
“No,
thank you,” I sighed, feeling for once like maybe I’d lost my path.
“See
you tomorrow, boss,” she said, giving a cheeky salute with her index finger and
heading out. I turned to find the subject had mashed one meaty mitt against the
glass, mucus splattering to cover nearly the entire surface.
“No,”
I whispered knowing exactly what A wanted. “I can’t let you out yet. One day
we’ll be together but rest assured I do… I do care for you.”
The
subject attempted, as he had done so many times over the last few weeks, to
speak. It came out garbled, a slimy declaration of what I was sure could only
be love.
“Yes,
I admit I love you. Just… for now, I must love you from the other side of this
door. You’re a lot slimier than I predicted and I need to run some more tests.”
Mind
buzzing with possibilities, I moved back to my desk intent on poring over my
journals until the solution jumped out at me like so much healing mucus.
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