Releasing A Vampire

by Jacky Dahlhaus

  “Yeah, yeah,” Dr. Bonnetti said. “Just get undressed. Leave your clothes on the chair and step on the scales.”

  Becker did as he was told. He didn’t bat an eye when he stood naked in front of the woman. He was trained to obey orders. Besides, he didn’t mind showing off his perfect body at all. He loved how his muscles gleamed with sweat after a workout in the gym. He admired how well-proportioned he was and how strong and athletic he looked. His manhood was also something to be proud of. His wife had often told him so, before, during, and after their lovemaking.

  It appeared that Becker was an excellent specimen to do the virus test on. He passed all the intake parameters as did most of his comrades. Only Milton was rejected because of a high level of protein they found in his urine. They sent him home to have further testing done to find the cause of it. Becker fist-bumped the others when he came out, dressed in a hospital-staff-type uniform, at the end of the corridor. The end where only the test bunnies were allowed to go.

  “Speed and Power!” Becker said to his troop.

  “Speed and Power!” was the synced reply.

  During the next few days, the green berets were more minutely measured and their strength and stamina tested to their limits. Their test results were far higher than the average gym-goer could dream of and it was almost impossible to think they could be improved at all. Overall spirits were high. They were told what the test was supposed to do and they were looking forward to it. They would become the elite of the elite. What was there not to like?

  Bullsbrook, Thursday, September 23rd, 2004

  Sometimes Charlie was in a dark mood. Sue was more like a bouncy Spaniel, always happy and ready for some fun. If Charlie had been a dog, I guess he would have been more like an English Bulldog; very happy and bouncy at times, but with a calm, quiet side too. Almost sulky.

  “What’s up with you?” I asked him one day when he didn’t laugh at one of Sue’s jokes.

  “Forget it,” he said and turned away.

  I couldn’t forget it though, so when we walked out of the school building that day, I invited him over for dinner.

  Charlie arrived that evening carrying a bottle. He handed me the Californian wine ‘as a token of gratitude for the invitation.’ I thought he sounded a bit formal and decided to ignore the remark. Together we made my self-invented ratatouille-spaghetti dish. As Charlie was a vegetarian, I left out the bacon that I normally would have added. It didn’t taste the same without it, but Charlie thought it was scrumptious nevertheless. He was his funny self again and we had lots of fun in a competition of who could slurp up a spaghetti strand the fastest. After dinner, with a large glass of the sweet wine he brought, we were sitting inside, enjoying the comfort of my warm home as fall made it too cold to sit on the porch. Fortunately, we could still enjoy the setting sun through the window. A silence fell after we closed the topic of how to integrate less bright students into the curriculum.

  “So, why do you walk around with a rain cloud over your head now and again?” I asked as I swirled the wine in my glass.

  I felt his gaze on me. I didn’t see what his face looked like and so had no idea what he thought about me raising the subject. Charlie remained silent.

  Only one way to find out, Kate.

  I took another sip of wine before I looked at him. I kept my face as blank as possible. We made eye contact but as quick as he did, Charlie turned his head and stared into the sunset. I didn’t move and Charlie still didn’t say anything. His gaze finally dropped down to his wine glass.

  “I’d rather not talk about it,” he finally said with much less enthusiasm than he had previously shown when talking about our teaching topic.

  Oh dear, this is more serious than I thought.

  I took a deep breath. I wasn’t going to take no for an answer. I knew something bothered him and I wasn’t going to let him suffer in silence. I let my breath out slowly.

  “That’s okay, Charlie, but you know a shared pain is half the pain. You know I am here for you if you need me.” I didn’t want to push him too much as I knew that wouldn’t work for sure.

  Another silence followed.

  I was about to get up to get the bottle from the refrigerator for a refill when Charlie decided to share his pain.

  “It’s some of the teachers at school. They are giving me a hard time.” He sighed.

  I stared at him without blinking. When my eyes felt like they were going to shrivel up, I blinked a few times.

  “What do you mean? Why?” A deep frown now on my face.

  I was surprised about what he had just said. All the other teachers were so nice to me.

  “Oh, it started quite innocent. At the beginning of the year, a few of them made remarks behind my back about my short arms and legs.”

  Charlie had been born with achondroplasia, the most common form of dwarfism. This meant his body couldn’t make bone out of cartilage which affected the long bones the most. As a result, he had short arms, and short, curved legs, amongst other problems.

  “Silly things like ‘I wonder which one of Snow White’s dwarves he is, or ‘where does he keep his pony that gives him his bowlegs.’”

  He looked at me now, expecting a reaction, but for a change, I was lost for words. My mouth had dropped open and all I managed to say after a while was, “That’s so wrong.”

  “Tell me about it, but that’s humans for you. Welcome to the real world. I’ve heard stuff like that all my life and have learned to live with it, you know,” he continued. “People stare at me everywhere I go.” He took another sip from his wine.

  I still couldn’t believe that my colleagues could be so cruel. I would have expected it from the students. I knew kids could be vicious in their remarks. I didn’t expect it from the people who were supposed to teach the children to accept each individual for their merits, not for their looks.

  “Since last week it has progressed into bumping into me on purpose and making the excuse that they didn’t see me.”

  “Nooo! You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “It’s true,” Charlie replied and he showed me a couple of bumps on his head. They were big bumps. They made me so angry. How can these people be so mean?

  “You’ve got to tell Mr. Finkle about this.”

  “Been there, done that,” Charlie said with a heavy sigh, “but Mr. Finkle chose not to believe my story. He can’t believe that his best and oldest teachers would do something like this.” He took another sip from his glass.

  I was stumped. “What about the Board of Teachers, surely they’d make work of it?” I tried.

  He shook his head and said, “Forget it, Kate. I don’t want to make an issue out of it. It’ll pass.”

  I wasn’t so sure about it. As I frowned into the sunset, I couldn’t stop worrying. I wanted Charlie to be happy here, just like I was. I crossed my arms and breathed out through my nostrils.

  “Look, what would be the outcome?” Charlie said as he repositioned himself on the couch, leaning forward. “That they transfer me to another school? That they reprimand the teachers and which will make them hate me even more? I like living here and don’t want to move. I have traveled enough in my lifetime and I want to settle down.” From the corner of my eye, I saw he opened his mouth to say something else, but he must have decided against it. I turned my head to him to encourage him to say what he wanted to say. Instead, Charlie sat back and without making eye contact he said, “I will just have to deal with it,” and he made a movement with both his hands as if to say ‘and that is all there is to it.’ So I let it be.

  I felt so sorry for Charlie. He hadn’t asked to be born like this. As if his life wasn’t hard enough already without people making fun of him. After a long moment of silence, I tried to lift his spirits and suggested a game of Pictionary for two. Charlie seemed to cheer up from it. The evening turned out to be very nice with lots of jokes and laughter. Charlie left at about 10pm as it was a school day next day.

  Lying in the dark i
n bed at night, I still shared his pain.

  Biosafety Level 2 Laboratory, unknown location

  Tuesday, September 28th, 2004

  The men from the 69th Army Regiment lined up to receive the intravenous injection with the live virus. Becker was the first to take the needle. He had insisted on being first, just in case something went wrong.

  “Don’t faint now, Gov,” Kaminski said.

  “Tell us if it hurts, Gov,” Grover whined in a female-like voice.

  “Gents, can we please act like adults,” Dr. Bonnetti said. This was a momentous occasion for her, potentially the lead to a huge step up the ladder, and she didn’t want to have it spoilt by silly remarks.

  “Of course, Doc. Sorry,” Becker said and frowned at his mates. They complied, but Grover had a hard time to suppress a giggle. Deep down, he was as nervous as hell. First of all, he didn’t like needles. Secondly, he didn’t like this whole ‘messing with nature’ thing. He respected nature with all his being and this messing about with DNA and the likes… it felt like raping nature. He had only signed up because everybody else had. Of course he wanted to help Becker’s kid, that wasn’t the issue, but to have something genetically modified injected into him that was supposed to change his body was not what he had had in mind, to be honest. Yet, there was no going back now. At least he wouldn’t be alone, he would be with his comrades. He would give his life for them. Yet he sincerely hoped this was not necessary on this mission.

  Dr. Bonnetti stuck a small fluff of cotton on the injection site with some surgical tape and told Becker to bend his arm to keep the pressure on it.

  “Okay, next one,” Dr. Bonnetti said.

  Becker got out of the chair and Kaminski took his place. As soon as Becker stood behind the doctor, he pretended soundlessly to choke. All his mates laughed out loud, except for Grover.

  “Please sit down in the observation area, Mr. Becker,” Dr. Bonnetti said without looking up.

  Becker straightened up. “Yes, Ma’am,” he said and turned around to go to the observation lounge next door.

  It was only a few meters to the door but by the time he reached it, his knees gave way underneath him and he stumbled. He could only keep upright by holding on to the door post. He threw a quick glance over his shoulder and saw his mates’ attention shifting from Kaminski getting his injection to him.

  “It’s the beginning of the end,” Becker said with a shrug and a laugh, pretending he had stumbled on purpose. The others laughed but not as enthusiastically as they had done only a few seconds ago.

  When Becker sat in a comfy chair in the observation lounge, he tried to make sense of what was happening to him. He had this woozy feeling in his head. A man with a big beard came over to him. The man pushed a button on the side of the chair and Becker’s legs were lifted up. The man then hooked Becker’s chest and head up with wires. Soon it became hard for Becker to stay awake. He felt extremely tired and could hardly keep his eyes open. All he wanted to do was sleep. He wondered if he’d been injected with a sedative and they were going to cut him open when he was out. He saw all the men of his team come into the room, one after the other. They were all quiet and went to sit in the comfy chairs without a word. Becker had struggled to stay awake for as long as possible, but by the time he knew all his friends were okay and still alive, the virus got the better of him and he drifted off to sleep.

  Dr. Bonnetti checked the vitals of all the soldiers. “Steady as she goes,” she said.

  All the soldiers were by now hooked up to wires to retrieve as much medical data as possible. What the monitors showed was that they were in a deep sleep.

  “Is that normal?” Walpole asked Dr. Bonnetti as he scratched his beard.

  Walpole was a lab assistant. He had assisted many tests in the facility, but never one like this one. Never had the test subjects all gone so fast into a deep sleep after being injected with a virus. Years ago, when they were testing with LSD, some of the test subjects had gone absolutely mental. ‘Those were the fun days,’ he thought. These days the tests were all ‘humane’ and, in his opinion, very boring. Especially this one.

  “Yes, all the lab animals showed the same reaction. The muscles need to grow and they do this best when the individual is asleep. As soon as they wake up we will start the questionnaire and measure their muscle mass. Let me know as soon as the first one awakes.” With that statement, Dr. Bonnetti left the room.

  Walpole watched the sleeping soldiers for hours. It was such boring work. As he watched the men, he couldn’t help but be jealous of them. Sporting a serious beer belly wasn’t what he really wanted. It was just the thought of not being able to drink beer that kept him from even attempting to go to a gym and lose weight. If only he could be part of this test and gain muscles by sleeping.

  One of the soldiers stirred. Walpole walked over to him and checked his heart rate on the monitor. The man was definitely waking up.

  Becker opened his eyes and saw the man with the bushy beard standing next to him. The man just put his cell phone in his pocket and now put pen to paper on a clipboard.

  “What is your name?” Walpole asked him.

  “Becker,” Becker said as he noted the wires attached to him. His gaze followed the wires to the heart rate monitor, which bleeped with a steady rhythm.

  “Do you know what year it is?” Walpole asked while writing down Becker’s answer.

  “Two-thousand-and-four,” Becker said, now looking around and seeing Kaminski stir as well.

  “Can you tell me who the current President is,” Walpole continued.

  “What stupid questions are these,” Becker said.

  “Look mate, I didn’t write them. I’m just doing my job here so I would be grateful if you could answer them and I’ll be out of your hair.” Walpole looked sideways now and noted Grover also waking up. He took his cell out of his pocket again and repeated his text to Dr. Bonnetti. ‘Where is that woman when you need her,’ he thought.

  After a few minutes, Dr. Bonnetti finally made an appearance.

  “How are you feeling?” she asked Becker. She checked his eyes with a light and his pupils were contracting as per normal. His heart rate and breathing were fast though. There had to be a reason for this.

  “I’m fine,” Becker said. He didn’t mention the intense pain he felt in his jaws. He didn’t know why it was there and he didn’t want to seem silly. He must have been grinding his teeth while he was out or something. What other explanation could there be?

  Bullsbrook, Wednesday, September 29th, 2004

  Two months of teaching had been tough, as I had known it was going to be. In my private interview with Mr. Finkle that first day, he had told me ‘If you survive the first year, you can do anything.’ It had sounded so easy. During my studies, I had made lesson plans and gathered science experiments I could do with the students. Unfortunately, the school didn’t have much material to work with. It appeared that the previous science teacher hadn’t been in favor of practical experience and had taught mostly out of textbooks. I basically had to start from scratch. I was glad to find some websites that gave ‘kitchen experiments’ that anybody could do at home to show scientific principles. So I had my students scavenge their kitchens at home for material. I loved doing experiments and, as expected, so did my students.

  Not all experiments went as planned. I made a typical beginners mistake when I walked out of the classroom to retrieve some material I had forgotten to get from the store room before the lesson started. When I returned, one of the students had set a desk on fire with a Bunsen burner. There was a big commotion of course and Mr. Finkle gave me a serious reprimand when I told him what happened. The student was suspended for two days. I wasn’t sure this would have the desired effect on the student, but I certainly learned my lesson.

  Sue had fewer problems with her pupils. She was such a bubbly person. Everybody instinctively liked her and nobody gave her any insubordination problems. Of course, there was much less chance of students sta
rting a fire in her classroom than in mine. I had the notion that most of the male students had a crush on her, from year seven to year twelve. Sue didn’t believe me when I told her my suspicions at first, until one of the students had put his hand on her butt while she was walking through the classroom during group work. She hadn’t known how to react and had ignored the incident at the time. She came to my place that evening, terribly upset, and I advised her to tell Mr. Finkle about it. She didn’t do it as she couldn’t prove it had happened. It had been so busy and chaotic in the classroom at the time that she didn’t think anybody else had noticed. Later she told me she had become a bit more distant from her students from that moment on, standing behind her desk most of the time while teaching. I couldn’t blame her. I probably would do so too, if I didn’t need to interact with my students so much more.

  Not that anybody would like to touch my skinny butt.

  Charlie had a completely different issue teaching. As he had been working on his own for years, he struggled to have people around him asking for his attention all the time. One Friday night, he told us he found it stressful he had to make sure nobody injured himself during class and it made him tense and very short-tempered. Whether it was his behavior or not, the students respected him. It could also have been because he had a world of experience and he helped the kids make beautiful things, from drawings to sculptures to metal and wood work. I was amazed that none of the students gave him a hard time about him being of short stature. They accepted him as he was, without prejudice, unlike some of the teachers.

  The overall experience the three of us had was that teaching was great. Despite the initial setbacks, it was great to interact with the children. It gave me a tremendous boost to see the light in the children’s eyes sparkle as they learned something new. Even though I liked the experiments I did with the kids, I enjoyed class discussions the most. To have the students interact with each other, dispute each other’s thoughts, give arguments, and interact. This was the world I loved; a world where people listened to each other and discussed other people’s visions without instantly dismissing them because they were different.