We wheeled the Shop-vac down the hall. I could hear the remains of number one sloshing around in there and I suddenly became very nervous. Sometimes the sheer weight and scope of what we’re dealing with just hits me, and I have to stop and just sort of think it all through. Of course, there was no place to stop and no time to think. We ducked into another chamber, a smaller one. My colleague stood by while I carefully opened the top of the vac and poured the strange gruel from the vac bucket into a oversized glass beaker. Once we’d got the whole thing in there I turned up a heating element under the beaker and allowed time for the remains to heat. There was a smell like curry.
We monitored the temp and when the display said 80 degrees we folded in the Goo.
With the process complete we turned up the heat once again on the slurry. The numbers clicked up and stopped at 98.9 degrees. We turned to one-another and I gestured at my watch and then the door. We left with the curry smell getting more and more pervasive in the cold space. It was 6:30pm
***
It’s 1:30 in the afternoon. April 2, 1985. Our testing has come down to one last monitored application and the tension down here is palatable, and not entirely positive. A situation developed late last night, one that turned ugly fast and had to be dealt with expediently. Because of the time issue, I haven’t had time to debrief the staff. I’ve no idea what they must be thinking. On top of that there’s the tangible setback of loosing the 3rd in command of this facility on the eve of it’s greatest triumph. Still I, we go on. Everyone here needs to see how this thing ends.
The Phone Booth, de-loused and gleaming, after wave upon wave of industrial resetting all through the night. I hear the shouted command call-and-response and flash for a second on how this is likely the last time I, or any of us, will hear the protocols. Three years work reduced to one important result. I was still in the reverie when the false wall pulled back and Subject Number One stepped into the breach looking exactly like she’d looked yesterday before we vaporized her. She’s not as outwardly cocky and there’s no talk of being able to see us. She rocks though, shifting her weight back and forth, as if she hadn’t been violently murdered by me less than twenty-four hours ago.
I smile. The oval panel above her head opens.
***
After the partying that night I got a call from the President.
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