Flower-stein’s Monster
(Random
2-word prompt- toss, specimen)
Thunder
boomed. Lightning crackled across the
gloomy clouds, and lit up his small, dingy room. The sounds of the storm were short and sudden
respites from the torrent of rain that hammered against the walls and roof of
the castle, and a distraction from the howling winds that roared through the
forest and found their way into all the cracks and cavities of the large stone
building.
“Gwhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!”
The
manic laughter filled the lonely and empty halls. It echoed against decrepit paintings, rotted
furniture, and neglected rooms. Candles
flickered at its touch… or maybe that was the wind. It was the call of a crazed and genius mind.
It
continued.
Flower thought
that the Doctor didn’t know when to stop; the laugh always lasted longer than
it had any right to. He stood up and
closed the book he’d been squinting through; it was too cold and too dark to
read, and he’d persisted as long as he could, struggled through the
anticipation of tonight’s coming events.
And now was the moment he’d been waiting for… almost. The Doctor would be calling for him any
second now.
The
laugh continued, and then a breathless voice called out: “F…F… Flower! Flower!
I’ve done it! Ha hahaha! The time is now!” He heard the Doctor break into a coughing fit
as he headed out and up the steps to the tower.
“Come hither and help me change the very definition of life itself! Gwhahaha!”
“Doctor
Smithenstein.” Flower bowed his head to
the tall and skinny man as he entered the lab.
The Doctor was hunched and bald, only a few scraggly white hairs poked
from his scalp; his body bore decades of wear and tear from late nights in the
lab where he’d focused on a singular purpose, his life squandered away like the
fortunes he’d inherited. He was as decayed
as this old castle. It remained to be
seen if it was all worth it.
“Ah
Flower,” he said with a dramatic flourish of his rubber-gloved hand. His white coat, a little too small on his
bony frame, strained against the movement.
“Ready the switches, open the circuits, and release the chemical mix!” He laughed his maniacal laugh. “The storm is nearing its apex! We must be ready!”
“Yes
sir.” Flower hurried to the large
haphazard machine pressed up against the left wall; it’d been put together from
all sorts of things, found things and reclaimed things, and the recycled LEDs
and bicycle lights blinked and flickered, an old ship wheel turned and pulled ropes
attached to several car wheels, churning a spectrum of coloured liquids in
vials and containers of various sources and sizes. Flower flicked a row of switches, each different,
and mechanisms whirred into life behind the recycled metal chassis.
“Gwhahahaha!” The Doctor ducked beneath the cloth covered
table, the table where the small specimen had been lain, and adjusted the wires
and pipes.
Flower
opened the circuits, pulling the big lever on the side of the device, ducking
from the sparks, and moved to the other side ready to release the chemicals.
The
storm raged above, and the clouds, visible through the skylight, thundered and
roared. Rain beat against the glass in
sheets. Lightning flashed, and for a
second the dim lab was lit by more than just candles and flickering lights.
Flower
opened the valve on the first pipe and a glass milk bottle emptied its thick
red liquid. He opened a second. Yellow liquid drained from an Erlenmeyer flask. And a third.
Green from an upturned vodka bottle.
Fourth, purple from a glass orb.
Fifth, sixth, seventh, and so on, all colours all from different containers. Liquids poured and
mixed into a vat near the Doctor and his specimen, and a huge metal arm stirred
and blended the concoction.
Doctor
Smithenstein laughed as he stood. “Gwahahahaha!” Did he ever stop laughing? “The time is at
hand!” he exclaimed. “Flower, raise the lightning
rod!”
Flower
shuffled across the room, and he watched as the Doctor filled a large syringe with
the chemical mixture from the vat. He
placed his hands on the crank and began to wind it as the scientist worked
under the sheet on the small creature; blood would be replaced by the chemicals,
electrodes connected to its neck. Flower
wound the handle. It was hard work. The long metal pole rose higher and higher as
he sweat and strained, the skylight opening on cue, as rain drenched him and
the stone floor around him. The storm
was getting worse, as expected. Thunder
quickened, lightning arced. The rod
locked into place and Flower stood back.
“And
now, we wait,” grinned the Doctor. He
stared up at the night sky, eager anticipation upon his brow.
Nothing
happened. Flower watched as Doctor
Smithenstein became more and more anxious as the minutes ticked by and
more nothing happened; the scientist wrung his hands in the candlelight, struggled to
hold his grin, cast regular furtive glances at the dead specimen hidden under the
cloth on the table. The weather was as
angry as ever; it had to happen soon!
And it
did!
Lightning
struck the rod with a loud zap, the room flashed with a bright light… and
everything went dark, candles blown out by the storm.
The room smelt of blood, or was it
just the aroma of electricity? Thunder
rocked overhead, and the only other sounds he could hear were the thrash of the
rain and the thrum of his heart. He held
his breath; he didn’t know what to expect.
And then the maniacal laugh broke
what remained of the silence.
“Gwhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!” The Doctor’s face was lit by a small flame, a match. “I’ve done it! Life! I’ve created new life!”
Flower
moved around the room, relighting the candles as the laugh continued, bringing
dim light back to the damp lab. The
scientist’s arms remained raised in triumph as the assistant approached the
table, ready to see the results of the Doctor’s experiment.
“Flower,”
said Doctor Smithenstein, eyes charged with lightning. “Remove the sheet, and let us see what magnificence
my brilliant mind has wrought.”
Flower
did as he was ordered, whipping away the fabric with the theatrical
embellishment expected of him.
“Oh.” The Doctor’s shoulders dropped, his hunch
hunched lower, and a frown fell down his face.
On the
lab’s table lay the specimen. Dead. It had been dead to begin with. Roadkill.
Flower had felt sorry for it, and that’s why he’d brought its corpse to
the Doctor, for a new life, but somehow the baby deer looked even deader than
it had been before, with metal bolts in its neck, and stiches on its head and
limbs. It had been enhanced by science and
technology, and had been failed by it too.
The
poor creature remained dead.
Doctor
Smithenstein cried out, hand to his forehead like a betrayed lover, and he fell
to his knees and sobbed. “F… Flower… I’m
useless.”
“No sir.” Flower couldn’t stop looking at the corpse on
the table. Poor thing.
“Toss
the specimen,” bawled the Doctor. “And
take the rest of the night off; I… I… need to be alone.” He placed his head in his rubber-gloved hands
and broke down in further tears.
Flower
knew better than to stay, especially when his boss was in this sort of
mood. He quickly scooped up the dead specimen
in his arms, holding the cold baby deer close to his chest, and headed out of
the lab and down the tower steps.
He
could hear the Doctor’s manic crying, no longer a laugh, echo through the lonely
and empty halls and amongst the sounds of the storm, as he descended further
and further down the stone steps. He
felt a little guilty for bringing the deer to the Doctor. And though it had been dead already, he’d
allowed its corpse to be desecrated and mutilated in the hopes that science
could resurrect a young creature whose life had been cut short.
Flower would
bury it in the forest; he couldn’t just toss it away like Doctor Smithenstein
had suggested. It deserved better.
He held
the specimen… the baby deer… tight
against himself as he unlatched the door and crept out into the squally night.
The
rain and wind hit him hard, soaking him through as he fought his way into the
cover of the trees. He was cold,
freezing. His boots squelched through the
mud, and he struggled to see a clear path.
Flower
tripped in the dark, catching his foot against a stray branch, and the deer fell
from his arms. Its small limp body
rolled across the ground before coming to a halt.
“Noooo!” He stretched out his arm to the body, but it
was just out of reach. He crawled along
the muck toward it. The little thing
deserved more than being left in the rain alone.
The
baby deer twitched.
Flower stopped
in his tracks, rain pouring down his face; he wiped water from his eyes. Had he imagined it?
The
baby deer’s legs kicked against the forest floor.
Flower’s
jaw dropped. He could taste the mud, the
rain, the electricity in the air. He
couldn’t believe what he was seeing; the Doctor’s experiment had been a
success.
It
lived.
The
specimen, the formerly dead creature, clambered unsteadily to its feet. It appeared to tower over Flower’s prone body,
despite its diminutive size. The baby
deer stood proud. Alive. Thunder and lightning careened overheard, and
for a moment, the bolts and metal stitches glinted in the sudden illumination.
“You’re
alive!” Flower laughed, fighting the
urge to mimic the Doctor’s manic cackles.
“You’re alive! You’re really alive!”
At
moments like this, he knew what he was expected to do, what he’d been employed
to do; he’d need to recapture the specimen and return it to the lab. But his heart won out. He couldn’t do what was expected; he had to
do what was right.
“Go,”
he said. He gestured at the baby deer to
move. “Run, run away from here. Go.
Now!”
The
creature stared at him with a deep intelligence.
“Go! Just go!”
The
deer ran. It stopped several metres away
and looked back at Flower.
Thunder. Lightning lit up the sky.
It
stood there, and he felt a sudden unease.
The specimen’s
eyes glowed red and it shrieked a blood-curdling cry against the storm. It disappeared into the night, and Flower’s
empathy transformed to terrified regret.
The
End.
