Dog Gone (18)
Dog Gone (18) By Roofles
I thought that the night they broke into my apartment and spirited us away would be something I'd never forget. And in a sense I didn't as I stepped onto the white linoleum floor. This lab room and my apartment seemed to overwrite each other as I looked around. I saw before me a lab and at the same time I saw an apartment. Over on the wall was a table that had been cleared of all supplies. We used to sit on it like a couch. Across from it was my main work station. We would sit back and watch as one chemical mixed with another and contemplate how things were going. It was far more thought processing than watching a TV but it was just as engaging for me then. The lamps the tables the chairs...it was all the same and not at all.
But walking into this room might as well have been like walking into my apartment. And turning around to look at the elevator door I could still remember them rushing inside. Rather it was my lab or my apartment they ransacked the placed. Knocked me out cold and kidnapped the two of us. The two of us...?
I looked back. But Brutus wasn't here. I could smell that scent. But for some reason now it wasn't the same. Nothing really was...
The paw that touched my shoulder made me jump. And I turned to look at the husky who had soft eyes as he inspected me. He didn't need to say a word. "I'm not fine." I answered anyways. "Brutus isn't really...real." I played the thought over in my head. "Here." I said correcting myself out of some futile hope of the situation I found myself in...again.
Stephany...I remember her only somewhat. She was older though than the photo we had seen. She had several master degrees in psycology and was always a brain kind of gal. A neuroscientist and one of the best...if I recalled that right. Maybe a brain surgeon? But I couldn't even trust my own memories now. Which were real? Which weren't? I wasn't sure. She really did a number on me. Using my own lab as a ground work for my apartment. Cruel but smart. They had me utterly fooled.
"I feel like an idiot." I said more to myself than him. "To be tricked, fooled and manipulated like that. I really thought I knew who I was and now...I barely remember my own name?" I looked down at my hand as the question left my lips. It wasn't a hand was it? It was a paw. A damn dog paw. I wasn't even human anymore. Damn you Hudson. Or should I call you Dr. Jericho now? The name you seem to be using, that alias of yours.
"So what?" He spoke up catching my attention. I frowned looking at him a bit annoyed. "You don't remember your name. Big deal. I remember mine and let me tell you something." He poked my nose catching me off guard. My ears jumped up before splaying to the sides as a growl escaped me. "It doesn't mean squat! I'm not a human anymore either but that's because I except that. I want to be a dog so I am. Even if I didn't look like this," he look down at his legs and over his shoulder at his tail. "So what? I'd dress up and play one every halloween." He grinned rather foolishly. I saw his point although he wasn't making it rather well.
"So you choose to be a dog?" I asked as if he told me he had just crapped a flying pig, disbelief coating my words heavily.
"I am who I am." He grinned but lowered his ears. "Gravy, Douglas or Eddie - whatever they call you doesn't make you who you are. That old poet dude said it best. A rose smells as good even if you call it a butt." I winced as he butchered the classic saying.
"Your an idiot." I shook my head but found myself smiling even in this strange, nameless body of mine. "But I wouldn't change you for the world."
"Or for your Brutus?" He asked hopeful, smiling a bit but he was nearly shivering in his boots as he waited for my answer.
"No," I mulled the question over truly thinking of it. The perfect creature and being, Brutus. "No. I wouldn't trade you for him either." Perfection was really but a myth and if it did exist...well there wouldn't have been any real fun in that. "I still want to find this 612. But if someone asks me to get rid of you, for him, I never would. Not even for a second." I stuck my tongue out. "I don't think I could get rid of you even if I wanted to." Imperfection was far more interesting to a scientist than perfection in the end. Always striving for it with knowing you'd never reach it. Because once you do your job is done, and there just wasn't any fun in that.
He grinned and wagged his tail and gave me a big hug, licking my cheek. "Biscuit and Gravy are back again!"
"We never left," I said wincing as he crushed my ribs. I yelped and he set me down. I touched my cheek and winced. "Ow, this really hurts." I wanted to rub it but it hurt like nothing else. The Brutus from before really didn't hold back when he hit me. If adrenaline hadn't burn coursing through my system...well now that it was draining away I was beginning to experience the ramifications of it.
"Crap, crap, crap." Biscuit ran around looking for something to put on it. He acted like a child that accidently just lit something on fire and was frantically looking for an extinguisher. "Here try this!"
"That's coolant. For like a car. It doesn't work on broken cheek bones." I said taking a step back. Was he trying to kill me? "Biscuit!" I said sharply as he was about to pick up another beaker and container with unmarked liquids inside. "Step away from the hazardious materials."
He whined tucking his tail between his legs. I rolled my eyes and headed to the side and opened the cabinet. On the top shelf was a med kit. I pulled it out and stared at it for a few seconds. The fact that I had known it was here...it was the same place as it was in that apartment. Yet this wasn't that place. And the dog with me wasn't Brutus. A cruel dream. No wonder why I had wanted to except it so bad. But the only real concrete memories I had were in the cell block as a human. And even then I didn't see Brutus once. Because he wasn't even...
"You know Hudson was wrong. I did build a saftey switch in the Brutus series." I opened the med kit up and began pulling the things out I'd need. Mainly numbing agents. "We fought a lot over many things. One such thing was naming the dogs." Being in this room seemed to jar these memories loose. "He felt that if we named them then they would become too human and we wouldn't be able to do what needed to be done. I however felt that not naming them was the cruelest of things to do. Even lab mice are named...
"I called it the Mother Hen Program." I slipped one of the gloves on a bit annoyed that it fit even with the change to my hand. "When they first...hatch they attatch themselves to the one who names them." I looked over at him. "If I was one for instance you wouldn't be able to get rid of me, naming me Gravy and all. Some of the other dogs seemed to have gotten rather attatched to the idea of having a name. And it became a thing around the labs. But a Brutus..." I used the word so easily now... "Doesn't have a choice. It isn't unhappy with the decision or how things turn out. It is truly happy being with the one who named it."
I back at what I was doing. "That's why I feel that I must find 612. Because although the memories are messed up...he may still be the Brutus I dreamt of. Played along in this sick game of his." I rubbed the cream on my cheek. It hurt but the dull pain slowly began to disappear as it was applied. It took more work than needed with all this fur on my face, trying to get under it to the skin. I snapped the glove off and trashed it.
"Biscuit." I didn't look at him. I didn't think I could. "Do you hate me. For being one of them?"
I didn't get a response. Heh...I half expected him to grab the back of my head and begin smashing it against the table in front of me. But he didn't. The silence was killing me so I turned to look at him.
The husky was leaning against the cabinet with his arms folded. He was staring at me rather hard, frowning really. Was he angery with me? Did he actual hate me then?
"Why the hell would you think that?" He growled slamming his fist agianst the cabinet behnd him and pointed other paw at me. "Didn't I JUST tell you that your name and who you are doesn't change the fact that your the gravy to my biscuit." That sounded...horrible wrong. "So stop with this whole tail between your legs fiasco and lets go find this 612 your whimpering over." He moved down the lab before stopping and looking back. "Do you have any idea of where he would be?" A smile formed at the corner of his mouth as he laughed a bit scratching his arm.
"Haven't a clue. We may be able to find him though if we search through my lab." That sounded wierd but I didn't think too hard on the issue. The thought of going further into this place though, for once, was something I was looking forward too. I was afraid what I might come across, to see who I was but it was a little too late now anyways. And a part of me was looking forward to it. It was a bit...unsettling how earger I was walking through this room. My tail was even beginning to wag.
"Sounds like the best course of action." And it was. In theory anyways. We didn't know what laid before us. The rest of the psycopaths in here had booby traps all over their labs and places, playing sick games and twisted mind fucks on those who wondered into their sick twisted versions of wonderland. So thinking of what I might've done left a bad taste in my mouth.
I smacked my muzzle trying to swallow that taste but it lingered. I licked my lips, all the way down to my jaw line feeling those long canines in my muzzle. I looked at my hands and wiggled my toes; felt my tail move and my ears fold back. What was I really? Who was I? A man? A dog? I was already nameless now I wasn't even sure who and what I was. Before I hadn't excepted it. I just lived with it. My body before moved freely and my mind was left to think of other things. But now...it was different. As if the wall that was blocking all those thoughts out had finally crumbled, the flood was unleashed.
There was a large computer desk with seveal older modeled computers on it yet I found myself stopping in front of the locker before it. My hands reached up and twisted the lock several times before popping it open. And there stood a simple white lab coat with a name on it. Eddie. I dawned it without much thought, slipping the coat on over the vests that I wore. It didn't feel right...so I undid the vest and let it fall to the ground. Much better. Comfort over saftey.
There was a new laptop though on the desk and it caught my eye standing out like a sore thumb as I closed the cabinet. Biscuit stopped as I sat down and began looking around again without a word. He really was like a faithful companion that didn't ask or questioned things. He just really liked to be near. That the only thing he seemed to ask.
I pressed my thumb against the touchpad and the light went over it. "Eddie Martz." I said loudly to it. I felt a familiar prick on my finger and pulled back in time to see the point vanish inside again. Just like it had done with the elevator; my fur stood on end a bit. It wasn't just scanning my blood but my whole body itself. If I wasn't sitting here alive and breathing it wouldn't work. Just like the elevator. You couldn't just cut my hand off and use it has a genetic key. You needed the living breathing thing. Brilliant...
Funny. I invented this thing apparently. The genetic lock. But even now looking at it I found myself marveling it. I just couldn't believe I could do something like this. As Doug I barely managed to use the damn blueray. And here I was now finding that I had invented something so high tech and out there. Like a bad sci-fi movie...heh.
"There's a journal here." I said not even really paying attention to the dog behind me. He was snooping around sniffing something but if I turned around I was sure I was just going to yell at him so I didn't bother. "No dates or days, lovely. Well lets see here... The Mother Hen Project is going better than expected. As ducklings and chicks, the instinct to follow the mother is overpowering. The same concept has been applied here to this hundred generation of the Brutus line. Once first 'hatched' they will take it on themselves to bond with the first one to name them. A clever trick really; so as long as I am there for their birthing...then this line of Brutuses will be far more easier to institute into the field when this is applied." The field? I wasn't sure what that was. It sounded familiar but no lights were turning on.
"What does he mean by Brutuses?" Biscuit asked leaning on the back of the chair and looked over my shoulder. He looked down at me and I looked back; our noses bumped. "I mean you." He grinned. I rolled my eyes pushing his head to the side.
He stumbled nearly falling over and fell to all fours. I ignored him. This only seemed to egg him on. So Biscuit crawled over on all fours and rested his head on my thigh and looked up at me with those large puppy dog eyes like some kind of neglected dog. He might as well have a dog bowl in his mouth.
"Not now Biscuit," I said flipping through different folders. He kept his head on my lap though and just rested there. The weight felt familiar, like a good dog coming to his masters side after a long day of work... I guess it could make sense, for a guy like me, to see a reason to bring the Brutus line up and running. Dogs were truly mans best friend.
An email popped up, flashing in the corner. It was new. Recent. Only a few seconds ago. Someone knew I was online...and I had a clue as to who that was. I double clicked the file and a screen popped up. It was a picture, an old photo of a woman who looked like a movie star back in the 50s or so. An actress, a star.
"Hello Stephany." I sat back in the chair as I scratched the back of Biscuits head. His ears jumped up at the name but he didn't do or say anything. But he was on edge...what a good dog.
"Joy: Welcome back Edward." I frowned for some reason when she said the name. "We were waiting for your return."
"Hudson really is close minded." I shook my head. She was a real weasel. No, that was an insult to weasels. She was a true cockroach. An insect, a bug that needed to be squished. No matter how many times you stepped on her you could just never be sure she was gone for good. "I figured that you were alive."
"Amusement: Yes. Dear poor, close-minded Hudson. To think he thought I still needed that old used body of mine? How sad. Then again we both have been known to reach far outside the box." The thought of being compared to her only further annoyed me. Stephany feared, above all else, death. To die was to stop growing, to stop learning. And the thought alone nearly drove her insane as age took its toll on her body. First crippling her legs and stealing her good looks away. She was beginning to lose motor functions soon after and had to resort to using a mechanical box to talk in the last days I had known her. Her reliance on machines only made things clear as to why she turned herself into this.
I almost laughed at that. Turned herself into a machine? Like I had, in a way, turned myself into a dog? We were two very odd peas in a very odd pod.
"It served its purpose though." I said without much thought. It seemed cruel but for her it must've been true. "In the end your body was able to give you one last final wish. A clean death for Hudson to see." Brilliant really. In our own ways, I suppose, we all were.
"Mild Amusement: Yes. In the end the body served its purpose. Pity: If only Hubert was still with us to see." I doubt she cared that Hubert had offed himself. She played a hand in his death after all. Then again she also had a hand in what happened to me. She really did love sticking her nose where it didn't belong, reaching into the cookie jar and being caught red handed each time. But she was only the gun. I needed the man behind it. I would deal with her later...
"Stephany. Why did you help Hudson? Or Jericho or whatever hes calling himself these days." Names again. They only further confused, ironically. "What did you have to gain from it all?"
"Surprise: I figured you would've known of all people, Edward. You were the closest thing to a friend I had ever known. The chance to look inside that head of yours was an honor. A privilage. And after all you didn't say no."
Somehow I figured that was the case. I shook my head. "What did I tell you?"
"Arrogance: Why of course; where you put the key." I frowned looking at that photo. I hated talking to her like this. I always had. "Inspiration: After all. You were the one who came up with the idea of erasing your mind. Hudson had put you in my chambers but it was always up to me to do it."
"And you tried to kill me before?" I raised an eyebrow leaning back in my chair a bit more. Biscuit nuzzled at my hand until I continued to scratch his head.
"Sarcasm: Because you woke me up." I didn't press the issue as she answered my early question. "Annoyance: You were always quick witted. Within minutes of being tossed in to my classroom you had already thought things out. Yes. I was the one to wipe your memory after the drugs were injected. To rewrite your brain. But it was all at your request. As soon as you met Hudson again, you said, you would be back to normal as long as I built a saftey switch in. As Hudson had stole from your books and used on the dogs. The saftey word. Eddie."
I kept scratching the head on my lap. I couldn't remember that classroom. Every time I thought of it or anything of the days before I had lost it all my mind would go elsewhere. To a park or forest with Brutus. I always hated the outdoors. And nature. It really couldn't fuel the means I had in mind or be of use. Stephany on the other hand adored the idea of it. The chemical reaction that took place in the brain when one was exposed to the sound of birds chirping or a fresh breath of the outdoors was almost overpowering. Of pictures of green grass and trees also began the flow of these chemicals when showed to patients and citizens alike. No wonder why she focused on such things. It was the perfect way to keep one trap in her world she created for them. Using memories of old places with positive stimuli of nature and environment. All the feel good things humans crave to have.
"And Brutus? Was that my idea also?" She didn't reply and for a few seconds I thought we had lost connection.
"No. The brutus file was something I added." Her voice trailed off a bit and I sat back in the seat mulling those words over. She really wasn't the type to focus so much emotional baggage into it. An unneeded thing that ignorant masses desired she had once told me.
"Stephany, are you still wired into the whole system?"
"Annoyance: Of course."
"Is it possible that someone hacked into your system?" I almost smiled as I asked.
"Humor: You know no one can do that. Understanding: Oh you were joking. That file is hardly touched. Your wit is both outstanding and redundant." I could almost hear sarcasm in that monotone female voice of hers.
"And yet you have a file for it." I noted but waved it off before she could begin again. "I do appear to be returning to my old self." I continued to scratch the husky's head. The feel of that fur against my skin was...soothing and relaxing. "But my memories are still...missing."
"Remorse: An unfortunate turn of events. A side effect of the drug as well as the...re-education process. Optimism: You weren't reduced to a brain dead hunk of flesh as so many others were. They just stared forward so lifeless and cold. Ugly statues in my beautiful school."
"Right...well could you locate a certain Brutus for me? Number 612. He seems to be...extra special." I was looking down at the husky who was staring off into space. He caught me looking and looked up and his tail wagged, and I couldn't help but smile a little at that.
"612 is still in the facility. Alive. But wounded." She stated robotically. She couldn't even insert an emote into it.
"Location?" Strange the idea of him wounded on deaths door didn't really seem to...phase me. Maybe because he wasn't the Brutus that had been implanted into my memory or that he was just another nameless number.
"In the impound under the city. Most of the Brutus series retreated into the sewer lines in order to survive Jessica's cleaning service." I vaguely recalled the stocky Norwegian woman. She seemed to be more of a janitor though than a scientist. Her inventions, if one could call them that...ended up being more useful as household appliances than understanding what makes a human human. Not something a true scientist would strive for.
"Thank you, Stephany." I pulled a small disk from underneath the desk. It looked more like a floppy disk than a cd but it still fit in the slot. I typed in the passcode to it and slowly shut the computer. "And goodbye." I said as the screen became static and only silenced followed.
Biscuit stood up and moved back a bit looking between me and the computer but he didn't ask and I didn't answer. To think Stephany finally made herself what she always dreamed...only for me to have a virus to get rid of that dream. And her. I'm not sure what worried me more. The fact that I knew about the virus to begin with, that I had already planned on getting rid of her or the fact that it was just so easy to do so. I would have to check the system to make sure there wasn't anything left after this was all over. The virus would do its job and she wouldn't even know that I had done it... Even at my request no one should play with anothers emotions so.
I'm not sure what the end goal was as I pushed myself up from the desk. To destroy the facility? To save the dogs? Or just wipe everything off the face of the earth? To sieze control over it, this whole facility? And continue my research in peace.
That thought did seem nice. But a part of me didn't seem to want that. Before I wouldn't have even needed a second thought to do so. I wondered then...did some kind of remnant of Doug still linger within me? I looked at the metal panel on the wall and the reflection. A dog's reflection. But if I peeled back the skin and muscle, cracked the bones open and scooped out the marrow and looked at the core of my being...who was I? Or rather...who would I choose to be in the end?
"Coffee." I mumbled rubbing my eyes. The thing I needed after all of this was coffee. I had been shot at. Attacked. Turned into a dog. Caged and beaten. And the one thing I needed was coffee.
Biscuit jumped up and ran around in circles trying to find it. I ignored the dog and walked over to the side desk and pushed the red button on the wall over it that red in bold black letters "PUSH THE BUTTON." The wall opened up and a cup fell down and a spout fell into it. It spurted a few times before churning out that good old bean juice. Cream and sugar were added and a metal stick stirred it. I don't know what I would've done without it.
"You want one?" I asked the dog who had stopped having a seizure behind me. The idea of giving him caffeine didn't settle well. Thankfully he refused.
"You got a beer or something?" He asked instead.
I looked at him before laughing a bit. He kind of reminded me of that Brutus concocted by Stephany. In his own way, he was.
Underneath the desk was a small safe deposit box in the ground. Typing the code in and opening the metal panel there was fresh ice and beer. After all my lab was my home. It had everything a guy could need.
Home, huh? It really did feel like the apartment in my dreams. I wondered if this was the staging ground for it then? That Stephany had used actual things from my life in order to fully integrate me into her system. Then how much was based on actual things?
Biscuit sat back in the chair with the beer as I pondered those things over. The dog could've been anyone then. It didn't even need to be a Brutus model. To think that even my oil factories of scent were tricked by that whole illusion and fantasy of that place was unsettling. Unless the dog confessed that he was part of this whole charade, I began to doubt that I would ever truly know who it was. The only real lead I had to go on was number 612.
"So. To the impound lot then?" Biscuit asked. He had been staring at me or rather watching with that brown and green eyes.
"Sounds good. You can stay here if you wish. It should be safe." Safe for him but not the lab.
"Nope. I go where you go." He offered with a shrug getting up. He chuggged the rest of the can and crushed it against his head throwing it over his shoulder. I frowned and he quickly ran over and picked up the discarded can.
"Tell me," I asked taking the can and dropping it into a bin. It'd be recycled. This whole place was just used parts after all. Everything was reused. Even the food apparently. "Why do you follow me? Why are you coming along?"
"What are friends for?" He answered with another shrug. "I dunno why. I just...do." He thought it over for about ten seconds before giving up on the thought. It seemed to have taken too much work so he just gave up on it. "I like yeah." He said flatly walking over to grab another beer. "So why shouldn't I help you out."
I watched the dog as I sipped my drink. He was larger than I was. Sturdy and built. A common thing for any of the dog series. Physically fit. It was the way he walked around and always seemed to be smiling and wagging his tail that I caught my interest. He seemed to be as bright as a dead light bulb. But for only a half second or so something would cross his face as he looked around making connections, figuring things out. He really was a lot smarter than he let on. Not only that. I never heard of a dog keeping their memories of humanity before. That would...complicate things if they did.
Biscuit was inspecting a photo on the wall. He looked over at me and had that look on his face as if he just cracked the patagium theorem but it changed in an instant to the dopey look he always sported. A large panting smile with his ears up and tail wagging looking like an innocent puppy dog. "Your in this photo!" He said a little too enthusiasticly.
"Well it is my lab." I noted walking over. There were five of us in the photo. Someone was manning the camera so that meant there were six of us total. Even looking at the guy that clearly had to be me, so young though... I just couldn't make the connection between him and me. It was a part of my life I wouldn't ever to truly be able to reconnect with.
The beer foamed up over his thumb and dripped down on the ground. Biscuit took another long drink before setting the can down on the table. "We'll be back." He said explaining his laziness. It was a good thought though. That we'd be coming back. So I let it go and headed deeper into the lab. And on my way I saw a military styled bunk bed shoved against the side. The same spot my room would've been.
It was really simple. Everything had been stashed to the side away from the main walk way except the three main lab stations. Each had their own priorities and were used for a specific kind of research. Yet it was how each station was set up and ready for the next run of tests that caught my interest. There was paper work that looked like it had been recently done, the clipboard still sat out with the pen on top. Uncapped. As if just recently used.
It could've meant several things. That they really had just come in an interrupted me during my work. But that wouldn't make sense. I must've been gone for some time but this whole area was freshly cleaned and set up. Leading me to believe that this area wasn't exactly abandoned.
"Keep an eye out." I warned unholstering the pistol from my side. I wasn't sure who we were going to come across.
But I took a sniff at the air around us. This body had its usefulness at times. There was another scent in the air than mine and the husky behind me. It had passed through recently. It made me wonder if, possibly, that someone had been here seconds before our arrival. They could've heard the elevator and escaped.
The door at the end was slighlty ajar and I pushed it open with my foot taking a step back afterwards. "Hello?" I called into the dark room. There was a crash as someone quickly moved and Biscuit was already in the room. The lights flicked on and I followed behind.
"Don't shoot!" It was a small dog. A corgi. A small corgi dog only a bit bigger than a child, cowering in the corner. It wasn't pumped full of steriods like the one in Hudson's office. I couldn't tell what Gen it was from. But it was clearly more afraid of us than we were of him.
"Easy Biscuit." I moved passed him and knealt down in front offering a paw. "We won't hurt you. Who are you? What are you doing in my lab?" It seemed strange saying that but it was true after all. This was my lab.
"This isn't your lab!" He growled his fur standing up. He really was trying to look fierce but the poor thing looked like he was about to wet himself. "This is the doctors lab! And when he gets back you'll be in SO much trouble!" He said scooting back a bit against the cabinet and wall as if trying to squeeze behind it.
"The doctor is in." Biscuit said lowering his gun and looking around tthe room. It was nothing but a storage unit in the end. Several boxes of beakers and materials. Several metal canisters had biohazard warnings on them and the other section of the room was filled with cabinets and tables all with locks. Papers had been stacked near the back wall nearly to the cieling.
The corgi's eyes lit up and he jumped to his feet that small stubby tail of his wagging. "Really? He's finally back?"
"He is." I looked at him and a soft smile pulled at my cheeks. He looked around as if expecting for him to just materialize out of thin air. His face slowly fell before he looked at me and his eyes widened.
"Doctor?" He asked his voice shaking. But it wasn't out of fear or confusion. His eyes watered up and he tackled me in a powerful hug. "Doctor!" He shouted nuzzling my bare chest. "I kept everything cleaned as you ordered! An the next tests are ready. And I was so scared. But I was brave as you asked me to be. And I made sure there was fresh coffee ready. And - and - and," he nuzzled further against me. "Oh!" He pulled back looking up at my face his tail wagging so fast I could barely see it. "The experiment you told me to watch over turned out to be a failure so I began running the analyzes to see why that-," I brought a hand up to his face and he stopped almost flinching as if I were going to slap him. But I rubbed a finger over his cheek and he calmed down.
"It's alright. For now let's not worry about such things." I said to him. Angelo. He was the runt of the litter, I remember. While another may have tossed him out I could not. The memory as to why that was was fuzzy though. I did it out of love...I'd like to believe anyways. And every mad scientist needed an Igor. At least mine was as cute as a button and nearly as big, heh.
On that note I found myself picking the small corgi up. He was surprised and possibly frightened now but I just rubbed his back and he hesitantly rested against my chest. "I need you to watch over the place for a little while longer, if that'd be ok."
He nodded against my chest. So I set him down. He still wagged his tail looking up at me. But I had already forgotten about him as I crossed the room, past the desks set up and to the stack of papers. They were newspapers of the world above. Every day for the past several months or so I figured evaluating the pile. At least I would have something to read in the bathroom, heh. The corgi really did keep this place clean up for me. Even collected the morning paper.
"Biscuit, we will be moving down to the next layer of the lab. Stay close."
There was a door inside the farthest cabinet. You had to press your hand firmly against it, release it lightly and then press back down again. Something one wouldn't do if you looked it over. A perfect, simple, means of keeping the door hidden from outsiders. The back wall moved back and slid into the side revealing an elevator. Another thing I appreciated with my own craftsmenship or design rather. The doors were closed. It was impossible to tell that it was in fact an elevator and not just another wall behind it. Sometimes the most simple of things are the best after all.
It was tight inside the elevator with the two of us. I tried not to notice but it was impossible to ignore the other dog squished inside the metal tube with me. His body was rank. It stunk of sweat and of a long day of work. His cloths needed to be changed and he needed a good bath. I needed the same thing but it was always more noticeable with others about their body odor. The snout I found myself with only amplified this fact of the male next to me. I kept myself composed, as one always should be, even if I found myself turned on in a sickening way by him. His warm fuzzy body grinding against my back as he tried to make himself scarce; in a respectful way trying to give me as much room as he could. In turn though he only seemed to make it worst squirming about as he was.
"Sorry, sorry." He said for the hundrenth time as he bumped into me. He was facing the back wall and our backs were rubbing against each other. I held my ground my nose nearly pressed against the door in front of me. He turned back around again, raising his arms up to the sides in the empty space above us and stretched his legs out on my sides filling the empty space. And in doing so only making the smell worst.
He reminded me of a dog that would lay down away from its owner on a large comfy cushion but could never seem to find a comfortable position on it. And yet when his legs were hanging off the couch and his head rested in his owner lap, his body scrunched up on the small space of couch left for him as his side was digging into the arm rest... he was content, happy and comfortable. Because he was able to be there with his master. No matter the position he found himself in. Truly a stupid but loveable creature. That was who Biscuit was. Smelly too.
The husky slowly slid onto his butt as he whined loudly in the small elevator. "Are we there yet?" He protested loudly. I looked over my shoulder and down at him, pulling my lab coat closer to me so it was in his face.
"Almost." Is all I said. I kept a straight face but a smile tugged at my lips. Stupid but loveable indeed. The husky head was at ass level and I almost made a quirp about it but he was putting up with the confinded space rather well. The smell alone was bothering me so I was sure it was bothering him...he was at ass level and all.
The doors slid opened and we both found ourselves rolling out as we both desperately tried to get out of the very cramped space. I wasn't sure of his reason but the idea of before trapped, so close with Biscuit, for another moment was almost unbearable. My face felt hot and my ears burned. I was even panting by the end of it as if we were in a sauna together. A hot sweaty, naked sauna pressed up against each other....
Biscuit seemed to be in the same condition I was. Panting and having to, rather crudely, adjust himself. I really needed to install some kind of air flow system into it. Well design it and then have someone do it that was. I stood my ground and dusted myself off keeping my head high. Even if I felt as if I was a baked potatoe in that thing I would make sure I didn't appear as such. Composed and collected that was the right of any scientist.
The lights flicked on only above us. We were on a large platform. I knew it well. Was a simple cart on a train track. A control panel was set up, ready and waiting for me to play with. The lights were out but I knew what was in that darkness. It was my greatest work after all. The Brutus series. Several hourglass jars were set up along the walls. Two rows for each wall like seats in a theater facing each other. Inside was a living being forming slowly through a transfer of cellular reproduction, much like the way a child is created in a womb.
I didn't question where the materials came from. My whole research was funded for and all the things I needed were at my beck and call. It was nice...but now I found myself not even able to turn the lights on to look at the once prize winning lab around me, in my own mind anyways. Biscuit seemed to have found a spot on the floor that was far more interesting than the world around us. Because as we moved the lights flicked on above the tubes to our left and right. They turned off as we moved onto the next set. And so on as we went down those tracks.
I couldn't blaim him. I was both admiring the knowledge of it all around me and sickened by the very thing I had created. The idea was plain. It wasn't thinking outside the box or anything. Cloning. I'd put just enough diversity into the pot so that they'd continue to look appealing to others. However in the end it became a race of darwinism. The strong and useful survived and the slow an meek were...recycled.
The very idea sickened me now. But a corner of my mind, in the very back, there was that voice whispering. That it was a good job. And even now I couldn't help but find myself marveling at the idea of implimenting it all. It started off like such a childs fantasy. Bringing ones dog back. But raising the dead wasn't possible, no it was stupid. Beyond any real reason. But to make a copy of the original was the next best thing.
I was recruited to the program after the Dolly Sheep Incident. We kept a lot from the papers and society but the government knew of our work with it, even the stuff we didn't even put in the files. We would create something perfect here. And then clone it. So that we would have a full nation of perfect creatures, obediant and willing to serve for the greater good. Their life expectancy would've been even less than a normal dogs though. So when the orders stopped coming down I changed the series and made it more...family friendly. I started the Brutus line.
They may have been original designed and used for military used but those days were over. As far as I was concerned, anyways. A friend for the family to have. Someone that would protect them and keep them company. "That was the idea anyways." I said aloud to myself looking down cast.
It wasn't going along as planned though. The rotating mechanism above me caught my interest and I looked up at the metalic hand hidden mostly in the shadows. It was administering another dose of the cocktail I invented. It'll stable the cells as well as 'encourage' cellular reproduction. The quickest means to speed up the process. It vanished from site as the cart continued along the tracks but I could still hear it moving in the still silence around us. The numbers had read 689. Nearly 70 more had been born since I last checked on them. Seventy unnamed souls that needed guidance, encouragement and a father figure. A family. A home.
I didn't design them to be alone. They couldn't function alone. No one really could. Isolated from this world. One would end up like Hudson in the end. Raving mad. The madness of loneliness that I had sought to cure with them. The Brutus line.
Even with me gone the lineage continued onwards. I just hoped they came out more... exceptable than the previous ones. I hadn't turned a man into a dog as Hudson had. Turning man into beast. He always had a sick humor with that.
I pulled the lever and the cart stopped abruptly. Biscuit nearly fell off the edge. He waved his arms trying to steady himself looking at me for aide. I watched him for a second or two. And reach out my hand and pushed. He fell backwards nearly screaming bloody murder. He hit the ground only about a foot below and was rubbing his shoulder.
"You could've killed me!" He shouted. It seemed far louder in the silence around us.
"If I wanted you died," I offered a hand after jumping down next to him. "You would be." That almost sent chills up my spine.
"Thanks for the assurance." He grumbled taking my hand and pulling himself up and nearly pulling me down. He caught me and we exchange a look, mine was more of annoyance than anything else, an he let go. "Where too oh fearless leader?" He asked looking around.
The lights didn't provide us with any real insight to the area around us. The only hampered us. Our eyes couldn't adjust fully with those lights on after all. If I didn't know already I would've over looked the manhole like grate on the floor under the rails. I ducked down on all fours and pulled the grate up. Looking over my shoulder at him. "Biscuit's first."
He rolled his eyes and reached down inside. An like an idiot he went down head first. There was a stair he could've used but the idiot thought it better to just jump down head first. Some peoples children...
I touched the lining of my coat and felt metal case inside the hidden pocket. My mind blanked for a few seconds before he called up to me. "It's safe. No big bad crazy psycopathic doctors down here."
"Joy." I called down not wanting to correct him that one was about to follow him in.
I landed heavily on the ground and looked around us. The lights above went off so I blinked a few times waiting for my eyes to adjust. It was dark and dank down here. And the only thing I saw was darkness. Except the nearly hundred pair of eyes looking back at us.
"We come in peace." Biscuit offered nearly cowering behind me. My hero...