by Francis Tint
There’s an audience for the presentation? This had only drastically increased Blake’s discomfort level.
Putting a pen engraved with a V in his suit chest pocket, Victor reached out and shook hands with Blake and Rachael. “I’ve heard great things. Looking forward to learning more about your findings.”
Rachael powered up the projector and started the presentation. Blake stood up and started to recite what she had rehearsed in her head for like the hundredth time. “Good afternoon. We are very happy to present you with the binding agent based on the…,” she stuttered.
Her mind went blank. She quickly flipped through her notes and continued, “based on the Dop5 protein on the….” She faltered again, struggling to find her words. Rachael cringed. This was too painful to watch.
“We’re just having a conversation,” Ashlea said. “Just tell us your findings. It’s not a formal presentation.” She walked up to Blake. “Take a seat. Show me your datasheet. Tell me what you got.”
Blake sat down and pulled up the datasheet. “Well, we tried a few of the proteins to see if they can efficiently bind to the HMID precursor,” she spoke smoothly and confidently. “Only the Dop5 protein has a real chance at reliably detecting the precursor.”
“Much better already,” Ashlea said approvingly. “This is what I want to hear from you. I don’t need a fancy dog and pony show.”
Blake smiled with a sense of relief. Why did she think she needed to make a fancy deck and script out her speech? All she needed was to do what she’s best at, science.
“This looks very promising,” Ashlea concluded after the duo had gone through their materials. “Good job on successfully isolating the agent in the lab. Next step, we just need to prep for scaleup! What do you think, Victor?”
“Can you go back to your calculation datasheet?” he asked. “It looks to me like there's an error here, in this cell.”
“Hm… let me check,” Blake said. “I think you’re right. Let me fix this. I don’t think it changes the end result drastically.”
“We should make sure everything’s buttoned up before we show people our work. We can’t always afford silly mistakes.” Victor paused, letting the tension sink in. “But this time, you guys are fine. Great job.”
“Good catch,” Ashlea said. “Actually, the reason I invited Victor here is because he brings in tons of experience on scaling up, and I thought he’d be a great help to your team. I’m sure you don’t mind working with him.”
“Not at all,” Blake replied bitterly. “It’d be great.”
The last twenty-four hours had been unbelievable. Her intern had almost died. She had seen a shapeshifter, and had witnessed someone yielding impossible powers like a superhero in a comic. Also, she had killed a living being. The fact that she had bombed her presentation paled in comparison to all these incredible events.
Blake continued stirring her latte even after all the foam had disintegrated. If this was a dream, it was an excruciatingly unpleasant one.
Her friends showed up and sat down beside her in the café. “Looks like someone can use one of my special drinks,” Tylor said, trying to cheer her up.
“You handed in your first homework to the big boss. That bad, huh?” Julia asked.
“No, not really,” Blake responded. “It had a rocky start, but overall, I think it went ok.”
“I think she really liked it,” Rachael added. “It’s just that jerk Victor with his know-it-all attitude.”
“I heard he’s a lot to handle. You got to watch your back, girl,” said Julia.
“I guess that’s the thing,” Blake replied. “Lab work was fun. I used to get excited to go to work. Now, it’s just not the same anymore. I guess that’s all part of the journey, working with people you don’t like.”
“We’ll get through this together,” said Rachael. “By the way, I did some digging on the whole Capacify program at Hermes. It’s quite a shady program. It targets people who live on the fringes of society. Promises on expanding human potential. A lot of the candidates are super hard to track down.”
“Basically, patients are going MIA and no one reports them missing since they don’t have a lot of connections,” concluded Tylor.
“Looks to be the case,” confirmed Rachael. “I also got nothing on Benjamin Jones, the program director.”
“Likely an alias,” Blake extrapolated. “What’s next? How could we learn more?”
“Ooh… let’s go all undercover to Hermes and find out more!” suggested Julia.
“I wonder if Corey knows more about Hermes,” Rachael interrupted. “Some intel would be helpful before blindly conning our way in.”
“I don’t know if we can trust this guy,” Tylor warned. “I did some digging. This guy hasn’t had a real stable job for the past two years, just bouncing from one temp position to another.”
“Hmm… looks like someone did some thorough competitive analysis,” Julia commented. “But to be fair, just because he doesn’t have a stable job doesn’t mean he’s not trustworthy.”
“Something last night still smells fishy,” Tylor added. “This guy shows up in our lives, and all of a sudden, we are now meddling with omens and human levitation. Seriously, something’s not right.”
“Well, Corey never gave me anything,” Rachael said. “I took that drink from that barkeep.”
“We still don’t know for sure what activated you. Maybe it was just a normal glass of water with mint leaves. When you levitated, one minute he was helping us get you down. The next he’s gone chasing after the guy without saying a word.”
“Are you saying they might be working together?” Julia extrapolated, taking a sip from her coffee.
“I don’t know,” said Tylor. “Seriously, we still don’t know how Rachael’s activated. Blake, what actually went down in the alley?”
She thought back to last night’s event. So much had happened in a short amount of time. She couldn’t figure out what’s real and what’s not anymore. “We cornered him in the alley. He took us both down. Luckily, I had the cryogenic solution, so I threw it at him.” She did not mention the shapeshifting or the fact that Corey seemed to be able to summon electricity.
“I don’t think it hurts to listen to what Corey has to say about Hermes and Capacify,” Rachael suggested.
“I bet he’d be great at going undercover,” Julia added.
Tylor pressed his lips. He failed at convincing the group to be more wary of Corey. He turned his attention to a nearby TV. “That’s an unexpected turn of events,” he said, pointing to the TV. “We should probably give one of our customers another visit this weekend.”
The caption of the news read “Orphan from suicide couple missing. Grandmother implores officials to take quick actions.”
Blake went home after. Even if the world was on fire, she had always felt safe with her parents. She knew she could always seek solace at home. She knocked on her dad’s office, “Dad, do you have a minute?”
“What’s going on?”
“I… I’m just a little bummed out today.”
“What is it? How did your presentation go with your boss?”
“It went well. I think she really liked it. But… I don’t know. There’s this guy I’m forced to work with. It would seem like he’s deliberately trying to make my life difficult. He’s nitpicky, just trying to pinpoint the smallest errors. It’s not fun anymore, Dad. I used to like what I do, but now I feel like I’m just enduring it.”
“What’s not fun anymore?”
“Science is fun. And I used to work with science, conducting experiments, making discoveries. I put on my lab coat, and I feel instantly energized. I feel accomplished. But now, I feel like I’m stepping behind the scene, and I’m forced to navigate politics. I discuss my thinking and strategies with this dude. But all he does is point out why things might not work because of the smallest errors on the spreadsheet.”
“Well, it is important to pay attention to details. I don’t think
he’s wrong.”
“Whose side are you on?” Blake said heatedly. She was hoping for some comfort, not a lecture.
“I’m just trying to tell you what it’s really like in life. Mom and I can’t clean up your mess. Work is not supposed to be fun. We only do it because we get paid.”
Shouldn’t parents instead give motivational speeches like pursue your dreams, follow your passion? This conversation was not going well at all. “I’m not asking you to clean up my mess. I’m just… I just want someone to hear me out.”
Her dad did not reply.
She sighed and gave in. “Anyway, it’s getting late. I should get ready for bed.” She went to her bedroom and pulled her blanket over her head, hoping desperately for an uneventful night.
The team met before Mrs. Welsh’s home on the weekend. “I recognize you young fellows,” greeted the homeowner, who had lost her daughter and whose grandson had recently gone missing. “I’m sure you all mean well, but it is a terrible time.”
“We heard about your grandson and we would like to help you find Sam. If there’s anything you can tell us, it would be very useful,” Rachael answered.
“I told the police everything. You fellows are not the officials. How will you be able to help?”
“Actually, Tylor here works for the forensics team,” said Julia. “He has connections beyond the municipal authorities. He’s helped federal agents on multiple cases of missing persons. In many of them, the feds would be completely lost without our boy here.” She nudged Tylor as she presented alternative facts.
“Exactly. What she said,” Tylor faked his best serious secret-agent look.
“Ok. Come on in then.”
“Would you tell us what happened, Mrs. Welsh?” Blake asked. “When was the last time you saw Sam?”
“I took little Sam down the park, just across the street, like I always do. It’s a safe and friendly neighborhood, so I don’t really keep a close eye on him. I was just having a casual conversation with the nice lady who lives two doors down. All of a sudden, when I look up, he’s gone. His stroller’s empty.”
“Are you sure he didn’t just run away?” asked Tylor.
“I looked everywhere. The park isn’t that big. Sam’s a shy kid. He doesn’t wander off. I’m telling you: someone must’ve kidnapped him.” She sniffled gravely. “I’ve already lost my child. I can’t lose my grandchild too.”
“Ma’am, we’ll do everything we can,” Blake reassured her. “Do you have anything that closely belongs to Sam?”
“So we can use our special canine unit to help track him down,” Julia added.
“Yes, I do,” she complied, taking a blanket from the empty stroller. “He never goes anywhere without his blankie. I hope whoever took him is not harming my dear Sam.”
“We’ll work our best to get him back to you. Take care, Mrs. Welsh,” said Rachael.
They left the house and spotted the park right across the street. It’s really just an undersized parkette. Nothing spectacular, barely any hiding spots. How could someone just snatch a toddler in broad daylight?
“Quite plain. There’s nothing to go on with,” Rachael remarked, “except for the surveillance camera over there. Hopefully it captured something useful.”
“And now we also have access to surveillance camera footage?” asked Tylor.
“Helps to have friends in IT,” Rachael winked.
No regular person could’ve kidnapped a toddler in the barren parkette in broad daylight, Blake thought to herself. She didn’t need to see the footage to confirm that. However, someone with unnatural superpowers could easily pull it off. She hadn’t spoken to him since the event. But in order to figure out who had kidnapped Sam, she had to ask Corey for help.
She still had so many questions about that night. Had he actually summoned electricity or had she imagined it? Maybe it would be easier to just start with what he knew about Hermes and Capacify.
The next day, Rachael called to meet up. She had already obtained the footage. That was quick. Good timing really. Blake could also share with the team what she had learned from Corey.
“Last night,” Rachael introduced her work, “I hacked into the network, did some creative programming and downloaded the footage from the surveillance camera by the area where Sam vanished into thin air.”
“You’re so resourceful. Seriously, that’s really good work,” applauded Tylor. Rachael blushed.
“So the so-called friends from IT…” Julia inquired.
“It’s really just me,” Rachael said as she adjusted her glasses. “These systems are really simplistically designed. Nothing sophisticated. It took no effort at all to get in.”
“Way to make us feel inferior.”
“Take a look here,” Rachael narrated as she pulled up the video file on her laptop. “Here’s Mrs. Welsh talking to her neighbor. Sam’s right here in his stroller. No mysterious figure lurking by.”
“There’s really no blind spot for anyone to hide,” Tylor remarked. A few more minutes passed monotonously with absolute dullness.
“I spoke with Corey on the phone,” Blake announced, breaking the silence, “to see if he knows anything about Hermes and Capacify. It turns out Corey used to work at Hermes. He says that, on the surface, Capacify claims to help people with their cognitive abilities, like improving their memories, advancing their math skills and all that. But there’s more behind the scenes.”
“Funny your competitive research didn’t show that,” Julia teased Tylor.
“He was forced to flee the company two years ago when he found out too much about the program,” Blake added. “They must’ve erased his record completely.”
“What did he learn?” Rachael asked. “What else are they doing?”
“They aren’t just trying to expand people’s cognitive abilities,” Blake replied. She took a deep breath. It’s time to come clean. They needed to learn the truth about the bartender in order to figure out where Sam had gone. “The reason why it was so hard to track down the mystery bartender is because the Capacify program turned him into a shapeshifter. Corey didn’t learn too much about the program before he was forced to flee Hermes. But he shared the layout of the building with me.”
The group was speechless. That was quite a bit to take in. Julia shifted her focus back on Rachael’s laptop.
“Is it just my eyes getting tired,” Julia asked, “or is the stroller rolling?”
“I suppose Mrs. Welsh didn’t lock the wheels,” Rachael said. “It happens. Uneven floor. Strong wind.”
The weather looked fairly calm from the footage, but the resolution of the video made it impossible to fully confirm the statement. The stroller continued to roll, and stopped just behind a short shrub. The plant was really too small for anyone to hide behind. The group wasn’t too alarmed until the stroller rolled back toward the grandmother, this time without Sam in it.
“That looks like a magic trick,” Julia said.
“Can you replay the video again?” Tylor asked. “Look, seriously right there, you see that?” He pointed at the slight movement about the shrub.
“That could just be the wind, or the quality of the video,” Rachael suggested.
“We need to check it out,” said Blake, “and we need Corey’s help.”
Corey joined the team at the place where Sam had vanished. “It’s really just a simple parkette, seriously,” Tylor said. “No dark corners. Just some regular playground stuff. And the shrub, which is too small for even a kid to hide behind.”
Corey led the group toward the paltry plant. He did a thorough search, digging into the greenery and patting down the soil. Nothing except for dirt.
Corey turned around, and Blake caught a glimpse of something foreign by the shrub.
“What’s in your back pocket?” asked Blake.
Corey took the device out, the one that had previously disabled the barkeep’s shapeshifting ability. “This?”
“Could I borrow it for a second?” She u
sed the device to scan the area carefully. As she hovered over the soil, a bracelet materialized out of thin air. She adjusted the distance between the device and the said bracelet. It would come in and out of existence.
“Invisibility,” Corey exclaimed. “That’s why we couldn’t see the kidnapper.”
“And it looks like your device needs to be in very close proximity for it to disable the power.”
“They must be getting stronger with their abilities.”
“How much do you want to bet the invisible person we’re looking for is also part of the Capacify program?” asked Julia.
Hermes’s office did not close on the weekends. Corey couldn’t be part of the undercover mission. He would most definitely be recognized at first sight. Tylor and Blake waited across the street as Julia and Rachael figured out a way to get into the building.
“I’m sorry, Ty,” Blake pleaded. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you guys about the shapeshifter right away. I didn’t want to drag you deeper into this mess.”
“Don’t worry,” he paused before continuing. “It’s a little disappointing that you didn’t tell us right away. But I fully understand. These are abnormal circumstances. It’s probably not easy to justify shapeshifting. We would’ve probably just doubted you. I understand why you did it, Blake.” He gave her an encouraging expression.
Relieved to hear that he’s understanding of her dilemma, she reached out and gave him a somewhat awkward hug. “It means a lot to hear you say that.”
“Sorry to break up the moment,” Julia interrupted in flamboyant heels and an attractive dress. She was holding four visitor’s badges in her manicured hands. “We’re set to go.”
“How did you manage that?” Tylor asked.
“Don’t look at me,” Julia said. “Rachael did all the work.”