by Mark Graham
“You need to go home and get a change of clothes for at least five days. If for some reason you don’t or will be there for more than five days, you’ll be given a set of coveralls. Hell, I don’t know, maybe you’ll get several pair and that will be what you need to work in. If you end up doing any wet work we already have a room for that, and all the tools, plus. So make sure you have clean underwear. At least with underwear and socks you can wash them in your sink,” the Director stated with a small laugh. “Actually, I’m sure they have a laundry facility there”
“But anyway, when you’re ready; and the sooner the better, get to our C-1 location site. There you will find a pink piece of paper at the back of the building, hand written by me telling you where to go and how to get there.”
“Okay by me,” Ice responded. He already knew that pink meant blue, and the Director’s signature was a Donald Duck sticker, and that it could be found under the bed at the location that was newly received by him. The Director was serious about doing everything in secret, and to code as much stuff as he could. Each agent was given different codes than the others so that if anyone did go rogue they couldn’t know what was really being said. A few years back Ice talked to a detective who was eavesdropping on a conversation. When the cop realized he had a federal agent in his custody he turned friendly. He told Ice that when listening in them they couldn’t understand anything the agents had said.. Even their experts tried to break the code and never could because several codes might be used in the same discussion, email, or letter.
Ice did what he was told. He found the piece of paper with Donald Duck stuck to it. After three hours of driving he found where he was headed. He was way out in the middle of “no where” and had to turn on a dirt road to get to his destination. After a couple miles he came to a ‘two-track’ path that led off into the woods, He drove on that for half an hour and came out on a large clearing with several large building in the middle. There was one building off away from the large buildings and Ice assumed that might be for the watchers, the staff, or somebody. He came up to a closed gate and was approached by a man heavily armed and looked more like a Navy Seal then a rent-a-cop.
The man approached his car and tapped on the window. When Ice lowered the window the man said, “Open your trunk, and your hood, then get out of the car and go over and stand next to that guy over there by the gate.”
To himself he thought, “I hope I don’t have a bunch of bullshit to put up with.” With the armed man still standing next to his door waiting for Ice to react, Ice said as politely as he could, “I’m sorry sir but I cannot allow you to search this vehicle or anything on my person.”
At least the armed man was a professional and could get two sentences out without falling over his shoelaces. “Please hand me you identification sir,” the man said in a non-agressive way. Ice gave him his identification and the man turned and walked to his gate house, picking up a phone. When the man came back the he handed Ice his identification card. “You’re free to go in sir. Sorry if we put you through any time delays. Drive down this road and where it forks, go to your right and you will end up right over there at that building.” The man pointed at the building Ice thought might be the headquarters, or whatever.
“Thanks,” Ice said to the man and put his window up.
Ice didn’t hear what the two men said after he headed toward the building. The guy who had conversed with Ice told his partner, “Right there is the reason why we can’t fuck around or cause problems just because we can. He’s one of the people who we’re told are hands off with a code H-5. In other words he can ruin our day and the day of a lot of people.”
“Good to know,” the second man responded while putting the car and driver into his memory. Who Ice thought were guards were actually FBI agents specially trained. They were not allowed within the perimeter, just to protect it.
When getting closer he could see that the entire compound was fenced off, with a twelve foot unclimbable fence with a whole lot of concertina wire running across the top and the bottom. Each building was individually fenced so it was impossible to leave one and get to the other buildings. The office building had a fence almost the same. Ice figured as well as this place was secured, their security made his security at his house seem elementary.
When Ice pulled up he was met by a man that had come out of the building he was parked in front of. He immediately recognized the man as one of his comrades in his agency and felt a feeling of relief. To say the man was big was an understatement. He was well over six-and-a-half foot tall, all muscle, weighing in at about three-fifty. He hands were mammoth as was his feet. Talon the Eagle could be recognized any place and usually wasn’t assigned to many, in public, missions because he got everybody’s attention. He too was in Desert Storm and got hit by a lot of shrapnel. His face was bazaar with kind eyes but a very big gash in his fore-head, down through the bridge of his nose, and down one check. There was another gash from that scar next to his nose down and through his lips. Ice remember when once he found Talon shirtless in the tent they were staying in. He was surprised to see a lot of scar tissue from both the shrapnel and severely being burned. Ice knew that Talon’s expertise came in as being a backup, a sniper, or just to make someone’s day.
Talon was glad to see Ice, so he approached the car with a half-ass smile when approaching him while Ice got out of his car. Talon had lost a lot of feeling in his face so he didn’t know if he was grimacing, smiling, or just looking stupid. He wasn’t stupid and probably one of the highest intelligence rated person in his recruitment class.
“Come on in Ice,” there’s some old friends in there you probably haven’t seen for awhile.” The statement was true. Of the six people in the room when he entered he knew four of them very well and recognized the fifth.
One of his friends got up to shake Ice’s hand and another jokingly hollered, “You were supposed to bring the trash out Eagle, not bring it in.” They all told stories of what was and what used to be for several minutes when a man, with a good tan, and white hair walked into the room. They all new him and understood that more than likely this man was the guy in charge at this site. His name was Sid Meijers who started out in the FBI, after serving in the Army for a few years. He was a no-nonsense kind of a guy but well liked and respected by all the agents. He had worked in some kind of capacity with all the agents; some more than once. He was firm but fair and didn’t have any problems in pulling the trigger if and when needed.
“Now that the last of you is here I would like to go over a few things.” The man wore a set of coveralls that were mid blue with the name he would be using in this situation,
sewed on his left breast pocket.
“First, we all wear this same sorry excuse of a uniform. A name is printed on your chest just like mine here and you will go by the name given to you. Only out here may you address anybody by name and you should get in the habit of going ahead and using the name on your partners chest.”
“Please, don’t personalize with any of these people. They may be released back into the world in a week or two and we don’t need anybody telling tales. Another reason is that you may eventually have to take these people out. You can be polite, treat them human, and get things they need. We have a few kids on site so far but expect at least a dozen more. They will be staying in the far building with their non-participating lab employee. As usual, no fraternization with the people. Period! At first just mingle and try to make some friends.”
“Kind of hard to do when we can’t personalize,” Talon said with what he thought might be a smile.
“Well Eagle, you know what I mean. Hell, we all do this every day in this job. It’s gotten so that I can’t befriend anybody who might seem interested in me or being kind. But, I am sure you all might have that problems.”
“All of you have particular skills, or at the best at some things. We will try to match you with people who can be used by those skills. Later you will be given the names and pictures of t
he people you will be in a relationship with. They are your assignments. Get to know them well. Since there are six of you it looks like each of you will have six or seven people you will need to get to know and get whatever information you can. At the same time you will learn who is assigned to who so that if someone approaches you and wants to talk to any extent, that you introduce them to the assigned agent. If it seems one of you just don’t get along with a particular person we can trade you off.”
“We will have a meeting a 7:30 each morning right here. Then another meeting at 8:30 in the evening. If you can’t make a meeting you are responsible to come find me and find out what’s going on. That’s a must. It will be a good time to get our minds on what we need to do, and possibly what we will do.”
“Also, anybody who needs to call out of this compound can only use this phone right here,” Sid pointed as he spoke. “I can’t think of any reason why, but that’s the rules and some one has to be here if and when you do so.”
“The building in which you will be working is the first one you come to as you leave this building. You will always wear name tags and inside the name tag is a chip which allows you into this area and the first buildings area, and any locked doors inside that building. We will want the children to have a trust with us so there will be a couple of you that will have them as a second assignments.” Sid looked around, looked at Talon and said, “Not you Eagle, you can cause nightmares!”
They all laughed and Talon laughed with him. He would rather have his friends be truthful instead of pussy footing around. At first he had been in denial and refused to go into public. He worked with a therapist and got so he actually enjoyed getting out and seeing people. He looked for their reaction and could tell something about them in how they reacted. His scars had their pros and cons and Talon had worked them all out very well with his therapist. He had a way of saying, “keep it up and I’ll pinch your head off,” to his co-workers that at first kind of scared them.
Ice along with the others went to the back of the building to a storage area. Each was given their coveralls. Ice had the name of “Todd” on his, and Talon had the name of “Charles” on his. The ID cards were made on the spot with their picture on them. The card was programmed to include the room they were assigned too. There would be no reason to carry “hard” keys with them. If there were any smokers they could bring in their own tobacco, and there were small holes in the walls with a button under them that needed to be pushed for it to work. The person usually leaned forward, putting the cigarette in the hole and getting a light. In this facility they weren’t interested in contrlling smoking and knew many people who smoked were easier to work with if allowed to. Ice liked a good cigar on occasion so thought at night time he might enjoy sitting out back, lean back, and smoke it. There were lighters in the administration building but they were all attached to a bracket. It was too easy from habit to just put a lighter in your pocket and not think anything about it.
After they got all their stuff they were lead back to the room they started in. Sid had a sheet with all the people’s names and who they were assigned to. Each agent got a copy. In addition, each agent got a separate small file on all those assigned to them. They were also given a pass code for the computers that were in their rooms. The use of the computers were limited as far as the inter-net went, but files involving any of the people in the compound were quite complete. Ice looked and found Joyce‘s name as one of the people secured at the site.
“Okay now,” Sid stated, “you can all make your way over to the building. Take your time. We don’t want the six of you or the seven of us to go in, looking like we’re in force in a gang. Remember, at this point it is important to make them comfortable.
Two at a time the agents walked to the building, taking about twenty minutes for the six of them to enter. They had been given written instruction on the building, how it was set up, places to be aware of, where the bathrooms were, and everything they needed to know.
When walking into the building they found a second set of doors that also was secure and they could hear the door mechanism buzz as they opened it. There was a hallway going directly to the other side with identical doors. They were told to turn left at the doorway and found themselves in a large ‘day room” with tables, chairs, and even a few couches. Ice was impressed when he saw a couple of ping pong tables, a couple of very good pool tables, and a couple other things that would help pass the time. They were told that they could be free to play any of these games with their “patients”, and Ice was itching to get a ping pong paddle in his hand. It was something he had liked since being a little kid, and when his day had come as a teenager, buying a table and some fairly decent paddles.
Ice walked up to a table that had a checker board imprinted in the middle of it, where a guy was sitting by himself smoking a cigarette. There was a small box with checkers in it and a chess set, both on one of the four chairs.
“What’s going on?” Ice asked the middle aged man. He had ample dark, almost black hair. In his demeanor he looked like a thinker. It was hard to tell individuals since all of them wore the same coveralls, except their’s were white with their real names stenciled on theirs, and the real name as far as he knew.
“Hey, have a seat,” the man said soberly with kind of a smile on his face. “We’re all here just waiting around and not knowing what to think of it all. Many of us are kind of scared. We haven’t heard anything and only saw one guy who was kind of old and he didn’t tell us much except he was available to us, and some goofy rules we need to live by.”
“Well, maybe I can help you a little,” Ice said with a smile. “First, the project all of you were working on failed miserably and the government wants to find out what happened and where the screw-up was. You’re being treated well, and your personal needs are more than met. Sorry if you feel like a lab rat, but we are trying to minimize it so we can get you out of here within a reasonable time.”
“I hope so,” the man responded, “I have two cats and hope my brother realizes I’m not around and will feed the dang things and clean their litter-box.”
“I can insure you that your family members have been contacted and told what was needed for them to know, so I’m sure your cats are doing fine.”
“Whew!” the guy said, really relieved knowing that his family at least knew he was alive and doing okay.
“Let me introduce myself,” Ice said, “My name is Todd and I’m here to insure your safety and if you have any special needs I can pass the word along.”
“Man, that is such a relief,” the guy responded and in quite a bit better mood then he had been.
“It sure is nice meeting you Todd,” the man said. “My name is Ted Commons, and I’m one of those lab rats as you call it. My job entails me administering drugs of different types and studying the results. Some of those little guys are cute, but many died difficult deaths I think. I think we’re testing mouse or rat poisoning or something. We’ve also come up with an anecdote for the stuff we’ve passed along.
“Any thing suspicious as far as you’re concerned,” Ice asked.
“Not really,” Ted said in return, “Nothing important any way. Most of us think the guy by the name of Dale, another lab guy, is hitting on Mary Lou and enjoying every minute of it. They make a lot of trips to the storage room where most of us don’t even go.” Ted gave off a little laugh as if sharing some work gossip would gain him favor with whoever this Todd fellow was.
Ice looked down at a small card he had in his hand to make sure. He was right and just plain lucky to get one of his assignees on the first try. “Well listen Ted, I need to meet as many of you as possible today so have to get around. You seem like an interesting sort of guy and would like to get to know you better.”
“I’m just a scientist trying to make a living. Brought up in Chicago, well actually in Glendale, a town on Chicago’s north side. I have a wife, the same one for fifteen years and have three school aged children. I like to read a
nd love to watch baseball. That’s about it.”
“Good, maybe we can get some baseball watching in, and I like to read too so we can compare notes.”
“Sounds like a good deal, and a better one then we’ve had here so far,” the guy actually stood up with Ice and shook his hands.
Ice couldn’t help it but he saw Joyce in the corner at a small table reading a book. When he got closer he saw that the book was on the New York Times reading list.
As he got closer Ice got Joyce’s attention, “Hey Joyce, I’m sorry I have to meet you in this environment.”
Watching Joyce he first saw fear, then a little less so as she recognized him. “Should I be pissed and get the first blow in or should I be happy to see you?” was how Joyce
responded.
“Yeah, don’t worry about it. With you I’m a friendly, so feel at ease with me anyway. I’m not here to harm you in any way,” Ice said.
“Well, I kind of know who you are and what you do so I have been sitting here worrying, especially when I looked up and saw you enter the room. I actually felt a strong urge to run, but realized I have no place to run to.” Joyce had a tear in her eye and Ice could tell she was trying to maintain her emotions, in what she believed was a very terrible situation. “Tell me what’s going on if you can,” Joyce asked meekly.
“It seems Joyce that the experiment I was sent on was a complete flop. A bunch of people died from it and we’re assigned to talk to all you people and try to find out what happened. We think that someone might be responsible for the failure, or the entire operation was other than what it was supposed to be.
Joyce answered, “Well, I’m kind of the odd one here in this group. My job is psychological at most, and as a therapist in the least. I have no idea of the work going on back in the lab.”
“To be honest Joyce, do you know anything about these chemicals we were testing?” Ice asked kindly.