The Devil's Vial

by Brumbaugh,Byron

  “Couldn’t killing the baby and saving the villagers be the most compassionate thing to do?” asked Emily. “I couldn’t do it even if it were. I just couldn’t make myself do it. Could you?”

  “Killing is not a compassionate act. Maybe an enlightened being, who could see all the repercussions of his acts, could construe it to be compassionate at some time, I don’t know. I could kill because it benefits me, or I could kill because it benefits somebody else, but I don’t see how I could ever kill out of compassion. I can’t conceive of a situation where killing wouldn’t involve my grasping at something selfishly. Killing is an action taken against someone, not for someone.”

  “So, you’d let the villagers, and yourself and your baby, die,” said Emily.

  “I would do whatever compassionate thing I could think of. If the soldiers then decided to kill us, that’s their decision. I don’t have control over that. It’s my duty to make sure my actions are compassionate. Others must choose for themselves.”

  “Richard,” said Emily, “you’re evading the question. What would you do?”

  “To be honest, given my past history,” Richard sighed, “I’d probably delay too long, trying to find a good solution, until someone else took action that determined the outcome. But remember, these situations are totally artificial. They’re like the Kobayashi Maru scenario in Star Trek.”

  “The what?” asked Emily.

  “Kobayashi Maru,” said Alex. “Don’t watch much Star Trek, huh?”

  “The Kobayashi Maru was a computer generated simulation created at Starfleet Academy,” said Richard. “It was designed not to have a solution that would avoid a disaster. It was supposed to test a cadet’s character. These situations are the same. If you were able to come up with a reasonable resolution, the problem would just be restated so it wouldn’t be an option. In real life, there are always options – you just have to find them.”

  Alex sighed. “Still, it isn’t very satisfying.” He noticed Oscar was looking up at the ceiling.

  “You feel that way because you’re trying to control the situation and force an outcome you find acceptable,” said Richard. “You have no such control.”

  “Like our present situation,” said Emily.

  “There is something here even more essential we need to understand and embrace,” said Richard.

  “What are you talking about?” asked Alex.

  Richard looked down at the table. “Is this table real?”

  Emily raised her eyebrows. “Jesus , we’re not going to get into an existential argument, are we? Do we have time for this?”

  Alex caught her eye and looked over at Oscar.

  Emily glanced at Oscar, who raised his eyebrows. A look of understanding flashed across her face. She hit the table with her fist. “Uh, seems pretty real to me.”

  “There’s reality there, alright,” said Richard. “But not what you think. Reality is a continuum. Each part of it is intimately connected with and dependent on all of the rest. There is nothing that separates what we call table from the rest of the universe. It’s all a human invention.”

  “Seems a little deep to me,” said Emily.

  Richard took a minute to organize his thoughts. “Let me try to be a bit clearer. There was an efficiency expert who went to a dairy. He studied what was going on and came up with some improvements. He got the owners and managers together to explain what he had. He started by drawing a circle of chalk on a blackboard. ‘Assume this is a cow,’ he said. Obviously, it was not a cow, but it was a useful simplification for what he wanted to describe.”

  “I’m having trouble seeing where you’re going with this,” said Alex. Oscar was back at the fridge.

  “This is what we do all the time. Everything in our lives is a gross over-simplification. Approximations that are useful, but aren’t real. They miss the essence of reality. Tableness is a useful concept, but it’s only an idea, a story we tell ourselves. It’s no more real than the chalk circle on the blackboard is a cow. There is so much more to a cow than can be represented by a circle and there is so much more to this part of reality,” he tapped the table in front of him, “than can be embodied by ‘table.’ The problem is, we forget the table is just an invention and we think of it as real.”

  “I don’t know,” said Alex. “The idea of table works pretty good for me.”

  “It does, and I’m not suggesting you should stop using these ideas. Just see them for what they are. Useful tools that don’t replace what’s real, but are useful nonetheless. In the same way, look at the moral arguments we’ve been having as a useful means of getting in touch with what is right, but don’t give the ideas more value than they deserve – they are just ideas. Don’t make Todd’s mistake. What you think should never trump what you intuit to be right.”

  “I’d need a lot of time to think about all that before I can understand it,” said Emily. “My mind doesn’t usually go that deep.”

  Richard sighed. “Me too. I’m still struggling with it. Especially when I think about how even ‘I’ don’t exist. What I think of as ‘me’ is just as much a fiction I tell myself as ‘table’ is.”

  “You’re giving me a headache,” said Emily as she massaged her temples.

  Suddenly, there were sparks over by the refrigerator next to Oscar. The lights went out and the odor of burning electrical insulation filled the room. Alex hoped whatever Oscar did, he did on purpose.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  “Oscar, are you okay?” asked Alex.

  “Get me the toaster, the coffee maker, all the small appliances you can find,” he said. “Quickly!”

  For a moment, they were in the dark. Then, after less than a minute, dim lights came on in the ceiling. “Excellent!” said Oscar. “I was counting on them having battery back-up.” He looked over at Alex. “Come on! Get me the appliances, quickly!”

  Alex grabbed the toaster, Emily the coffee maker and Doug the microwave. “No, no,” said Oscar. “Not the microwave. I’m going to need that.” Doug set it back down. “Go into the other rooms and get me everything you can find that’s plugged into the wall. Lights, radios, everything.” Doug and Richard ran out of the cafeteria as Alex and Emily passed Oscar the toaster and coffee maker. Oscar began ripping out the power cords with something that looked like a knife. Seeing Alex looking at it, he said, “What, did you really think I’ve just been sleeping all this time?” He had a broad smile on his face.

  Alex smiled back. “Is it safe to talk?” he asked.

  “I think so,” said Oscar. Doug came back in the room with a desk lamp, followed by Richard with an alarm clock.

  Oscar worked furiously, doing something with the power cords as he explained. “I short-circuited the power bus.” He thrust his chin toward the cord that used to be connected to the refrigerator, but was still plugged into the wall. “I figure the surveillance equipment is powered by the main bus. The lights that’re on now are probably powered by batteries and come on when they sense a power loss.” He handed Doug and Richard the two cords he had been working on. “Take these and plug them into wall sockets in different rooms. Hurry, before they try to reset the breakers.”

  Emily had a puzzled look on her face. “What are we doing that for?” she asked.

  Oscar was already tearing into the light and alarm clock. “I want to make sure all circuits on this floor are shorted out so they can’t power up part of the floor by isolating a few bad circuits. Now hurry, we don’t have much time.”

  Emily accepted the cord offered her and rushed toward the door. “I guess you haven’t been sleeping, have you?”

  “Nope,” said Oscar. “Been cheeking my meds. Here, take this.” He handed Alex the cord that used to be attached to the desk lamp.

  Alex looked uncertainly around the room as he took the cord. “Are you sure they can’t hear or see us?”

  “Uh… no,” said Oscar. “But I figure they probably plugged their eyes and ears into the wall as an afterthought after we got her
e. This place doesn’t look like it was designed to be a prison.” He rolled his wheelchair over to the microwave. “Now, leave me alone. I have another surprise in mind for when they turn the power back on.”

  “Shouldn’t we expect visitors soon?” said Doug. “Coming to check on us?”

  “Can’t,” said Oscar. “Not if the only way in here is by elevator.” He smiled. “It’s shorted out too.”

  Alex and Doug took their cords and fled into the hall. Richard was walking toward Alex from one of the rooms on the right. “Where have you guys plugged in the cords?” asked Alex.

  Richard pointed in the dim light toward a room close by. “There,” he said and moved his hand toward another room. “And Emily’s in there.”

  Alex nodded and headed toward a different room. Doug ran toward yet another. “You need to tell us about your idea,” Alex said, turning his head back to look at Richard.

  “Let’s get back together in the cafeteria as soon as you’re done there,” said Richard.

  Alex entered the room and looked around. Whatever it had been used for before, it now stood empty. He found a wall socket and plugged in his cord. As he did so, he noticed Oscar cut the cord, bared the insulation and twisted the wires together so there was a dead short. Alex’s task done, he headed back toward the cafeteria, moving fast.

  The others were waiting for him as he came in. Oscar was still over by the microwave, doing something to it.

  Doug looked at Richard. “So, what’s your idea?” he asked.

  Richard took a breath and sighed. “It’s a little suicidal,” he said hesitantly.

  The others waited for him to continue.

  “This place is wired to blow,” he said. “There’s some kind of high-temperature bomb built into the place underneath us somewhere. It’s supposed to be a failsafe device designed to destroy biologically active agents in the case of emergency.” He paused for a moment. “If we can get to it and if we can figure out how to set it off, we can use it to destroy this place. But Todd and his minions aren't going to just stand by and let us do it without using lethal force to try to stop us.”

  No one said anything for a few seconds.

  “There’s another thing to think about,” said Richard. “We haven’t been able to figure out how to safely neutralize the virus in the vial. The vial is here. If we set off the bomb, it’ll destroy the vial and virus in it too. We would no longer have to worry about it falling into the wrong hands.”

  “Okay,” said Emily. “So we know the stakes. Where’s the bomb and how do we set it off?”

  “I can’t do this alone, but we all don’t have to risk our lives. Who’ll help me?” asked Richard.

  Everyone nodded. “We’re all with you,” said Alex.

  “You too, Oscar?” Richard looked over to where Oscar was working. “You are the one person whose help I will absolutely need.”

  “Yeah. I’m in,” said Oscar. “Give me just a minute to finish here.”

  “Okay. I know of only one place we can activate it,” said Richard. “That’s down in the control room in the lab below. We need to get two keys. I know Todd has one around his neck and Martin has one, too. There may be others.”

  “I’m done,” said Oscar as he wheeled over to join the others. “When they try to turn the power back on, there should be a surge. I’ve fixed the microwave to generate an electromagnetic pulse that should fry the more delicate electronics in range. Stuff like computers, small surveillance equipment, stuff like that. It may give us a little more time.” He paused in thought for a moment. “We may be able to hot-wire your bomb, Richard. I’ll bet the mechanism is hooked up to a computer somewhere as a safety measure.” He smiled broadly. “Me and computers, we grok each other.”

  “Well,” said Alex, “I guess the first thing to do is figure out how to get to the lab.” He looked over at Doug. Doug was being unusually quiet. This was the point where he usually stepped in and took control. “What do you think, Doug?”

  Doug seemed to give himself a little shake. He looked at Oscar. “Are the elevators still out? If so, for how long?”

  “That depends on which breaker I was able to blow.” Just then, there was a flicker of the lights and the distant sound of a thud. “Ah,” said Oscar. “I think that might have been the main breaker. We shorted out all the circuits on this floor. If we put enough load on the circuits, it should have opened the breaker to the whole place, including the elevators. I’d say we have fifteen minutes or more before they can start turning stuff on elsewhere.”

  “What about the lab?” asked Richard. “We don’t know what kind of noxious stuff they have down there. Could we have unintentionally released something nasty?”

  “I doubt it,” said Alex. “I’m sure they have backup generators to power the lab, just in case.”

  “Oscar, is there any way you can give us some more time?” asked Doug. “Can you disable the elevators for longer?”

  Oscar smiled. “No problem. I just need to mess with the call buttons a little.”

  “Get on it, then,” said Doug. Oscar wheeled out into the hall.

  “Richard,” said Doug, “you’ve been here longer than the rest of us. Have you seen any evidence of a back door to this place? Stairs, or people coming onto the floor from some other direction than the elevators?”

  “No,” said Richard. “Everybody comes in by the elevator.”

  “Good,” said Doug. “And we’ve blocked that way in. We have a little time.”

  “We still need to find some way to get to the lab,” said Alex.

  “The elevator shaft,” said Emily.

  “They may try to get to us that way,” said Doug. “Still, that is the only option I see right now. We're going to need some kind of rope.”

  “How are we going to get Oscar down the shaft?” asked Richard.

  “We'll just have to lower him down,” said Doug. “Maybe we can tie the rope to his chair...” He turned to Emily. “Emily, you and Alex go get all the bed sheets, wires, cables, anything that you can find that we can use.”

  “Try the ceiling,” said Oscar from down the hall. “They probably have computer cables, phone lines and other wires running up there.”

  “Okay,” said Doug. “Let’s get moving. We probably don’t have much time. If this is going to work, we’re going to need the element of surprise. We’ve knocked them off balance. We can’t give them enough time to get back on their feet.”

  Alex nodded and followed Emily out into the hall. It felt good to be taking action again.

  . . .

  They reassembled at the elevator. Alex and Emily found quite a lot of cable in the ceiling and were able to collect some long lengths of tough, yet flexible wire that they twisted together into long rope. They tore the bed sheets up into strips and used them to bind the cables together. It all took about a half hour. During that time, they thought they heard two more attempts to bring back the electricity. The elevator remained silent and no sound of activity came from the shaft.

  “I don’t get it,” said Emily as she and Alex dragged the “rope” to the elevator doors.

  “What’s that?” asked Alex.

  “We haven’t seen or heard anything of the suits. I would have expected them to be all over us by now. I don’t like it. Something’s up.”

  “You’re just being paranoid,” said Alex. “They’re probably concentrating on getting the power back on.”

  “Maybe… I just think they’d be more aggressive about finding out what we’re up to. I know I would.”

  “Okay,” said Doug. “Let’s open the elevator door and find something to secure the rope to. Oscar, you have a lever?”

  Oscar reached down in his wheelchair and held up one of the brake handles. “Here you go,” he said.

  Doug forced it between the doors and leveraged them open a crack - just enough to get his fingers in. Alex reached out and put his fingers in the gap as well and the two of them pulled in opposite directions. The doors opened
, revealing a large dark hole.

  “No emergency lighting in here,” said Alex. No sound could be heard in the shaft.

  “Oscar?” said Doug.

  Oscar reached down beside his wheelchair and produced a light and battery. “Thought you might need this,” he said. “I kludged this together from the emergency light I had you rip out of the ceiling.”

  Doug smiled. “I knew I could count on you.” He took the offered light and shined it into the shaft.

  Alex could see the elevator cable, the rails the car rolled on, and beams and struts that supported it. “Plenty to tie the rope on here,” said Alex.

  “Secure it here,” said Doug, grabbing a hold of a strut.

  Alex grabbed the rope and twisted it around the strut. It was stiffer than hemp, but he was able to secure it just the same.

  Doug pulled on the rope and, satisfied, turned to Richard. “We’re good to go. But before we do, there’s one thing we need to know. Where is the vial?” He was looking straight at Richard.

  Richard stood quietly, looking back at Doug, as if trying to make a decision. “Why do you need to know?” he asked.

  “We need to be sure the bomb will destroy it. If the vial is up here and the bomb down there, I’m not so sure…”

  “Oh, yeah,” said Richard. “Good point.” He went over to the wall a few feet from the elevator. Reaching down under the edge of the carpet, he pulled out the vial and held it up to Doug. “Right here. I guess we should take it with us.”

  “Yes, we should,” said Doug as he reached out and took the vial.

  Richard stood, mouth slightly open, as if he were going to speak. He didn’t seem to be happy about Doug taking the vial.

  Doug placed the vial in a shirt pocket and patted it. “I wouldn’t want to give up my life without destroying this thing.”

  Richard closed his mouth and nodded.

  Alex stuck his head out over the edge and looked down into the depths below. He took the makeshift flashlight from Doug and tried to shine it into the darkness to see how far down they would have to go, but the abyss soaked up the light like a blotter does ink. He could only see maybe fifteen feet, and then impenetrable blackness. He thought he heard something above him. His curiosity aroused, he shined the light upward and saw a pair of boots and pant legs. Several ropes dropped down in front of him and the boots got closer.