|
Professor Garrison guided his black Beamer down the gravel driveway of the Newark Institute, past the century-old oaks and manicured lawns, as the first rays of daylight crept over the horizon. He smiled up at the pink sky as the Institute, which looked like a three-storey mansion, loomed into view. It was actually a concrete bunker. The windows were fake. The double doors were reinforced steel, hidden behind wood veneer, and opened into a hermetically sealed airlock. With the doors shut, the only light inside the building was artificial.
As Garrison pulled up outside the building a Secret Service agent dressed as a valet emerged, checked his credentials, then opened his door for him.
“Morning, Professor,” the valet said, his breath pluming like smoke in the chilly air.
“Morning, Ben. Kids dragging you out trick or treating tonight?” Garrison said, climbing out of the driver’s seat.
“Yes, sir.”
“Don’t let them eat it all at once,” he said.
Ben grinned and climbed into the Beamer, offering a wave as Garrison climbed the six steps to the porch and swiped his card. He peered up at the security camera.
“Morning Dave,” he said, offering a wave.
The cameras didn’t have sound, but manners didn’t cost anything. It wasn’t so long ago that Garrison was flipping hamburgers and delivering pizzas to fund his research. He could appreciate how much better a tedious job was when customers made an effort. And things didn’t get much more tedious than Dave Wilson’s job. He ran the ground floor security hub, totally cut off from the rest of the centre. The idea was that if something went wrong – perish the thought – Dave, or his equivalent on floors one, two, and the basement would call in the cavalry. The army, Atomic Biological Chemical Decon Unit, Scooby fucking Doo – whatever it took.
The card swipe buzzed and Garrison pushed, black leather glove against wood veneer. He took one last look over his shoulder at the orange and gold trees and autumn sky.
#
Professor Garrison’s lab was no more than a desk and some compact scientific equipment, shoe-horned into a specially built room in the centre of the Institute. The walls were plastered with newspaper cuttings, calculations, and the odd Far Side cartoon. His large oak desk took up much of the space, leaving a narrow gap between it and the bank of scientific equipment on the other side of the room, and a battered, dusky green filing cabinet with nothing in it.
This morning, just like every other weekday morning, he slid in behind his desk, logged on, and nodded at the filing cabinet, saying a silent prayer that he was here and not still back in the draughty garage that served as his lab until three years ago. The filing cabinet kept him grounded, reminded him of the hard slog, and everyone who had ever doubted him.
There’s no such thing as 100 per cent black. That’s what his university physics lecturer told him. In the same way nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. But what if there was? What if there was a substance that absorbed every scrap of light? The lecturer waved it away. It’s like asking what if we could travel faster than the speed of light – it would mean rewriting the laws of physics.
That was ten years ago, and he was almost there.
It wasn’t until he produced a substance that achieved 99 per cent light absorption that the military started taking notice. And not a moment too soon, he’d maxed out all fifteen credit cards he owned and had debt collectors knocking on his door. Kicking it down, almost. When he reacher 99.2 per cent, the military made him an official consultant and found a practical use for his black paint. Camouflage. Using UltraBlack as an ‘undercoat’ for a micro-video camouflage system. The black paint drew in all available light, and a mesh of miniature screens across the body of the military hardware projected an interpretation of whatever it was standing in front of, thereby making it almost invisible.
When they moved him to the Institute he received access not only to funding, but to things he had only ever dreamt about. The military boffins had found practical applications for quantum physics theories he’d thought were just that – theories. Working with the ESU – the Extreme Science Unit - they achieved 99.8 per cent light absorption.
Three weeks ago he reached 99.99 per cent, and was beginning to understand how Oppenheimer must have felt in those final days. The Joint Chiefs of Staff were visiting today, hence the early start. Garrison hoped to have something special to show them.
He moved some figures about on the screen, hit enter, and grinned. He’d been through this too many times to automatically believe that a computer simulation could be completely accurate, but he knew it was an improvement. And where you’re on 99.99 per cent, any improvement is going to be massive. He double-clicked on the blender icon, and the machines on the other side of the room whirred into action, mixing a new version of UltraBlack. He climbed out from behind his desk and, hands shaking slightly, pulled the canister out from the centrifuge.
He glanced up at the comforting black eye of the security camera. Ready to witness history, Dave? He slotted the canister into the photon reader, which connected the light and sensor array inside the canister to his PC. When he flicked the switch, a light inside the canister would flick on for one trillionth of a second, and the array would gauge the light absorption potential of UltraBlack v197.6. He flicked the switch.
‘ERR’, the red display flashed. Error.
Frowning, he pulled the canister out, checked the contacts, then side it back in. He flicked the switch again.
‘ERR’.
“Jesus,” he muttered. “Not today, of all days.”
He pulled the canister out and slotted it into the backup machine.
‘ERR’.
He yanked the canister out and screwed the lid off.
* * *
Dave Wilson watched the limousine and entourage of Secret Service humvees make their steady way up the long, curved gravel driveway. The security monitor showed it in shades of drab grey and Wilson wondered, for probably the millionth time why, with all the Brainiacs about, they couldn’t wire up a colour security system. Shades of grey just didn’t do Newark’s grounds justice. His eyes skimmed across the bank of monitors to the image of front of house, where the Director and senior researchers were waiting to greet the Washington bigwigs. The doors, he was pleased to see, were shut. Sometimes the Director liked to flout security protocol.
Then Wilson noticed the flashing red warning light on his control panel.
“Uh-oh.”
He jabbed the light with his pudgy thumb, and the main monitor flicked to black. What it should have shown was Professor Garrison’s Black Ops lab. Black, very funny. Maybe someone was pulling his chain. He picked up the phone and dialled Garrison’s number.
On the next monitor over, the important men and women shook hands.
Nothing. No engaged signal. No dial tone. No leave a message. He fingered the cut-off and dialled the ground floor security station.
“Banger. Wilson here. I’ve lost Garrison’s vid and his phone’s dead. Can you check it out?”
Wilson hung up and turned his attention to what was happening outside. The director was gesturing at a couple of grey blobs on the lawn. Squirrels frolicking. They all laughed as though none of them had seen pictures of the GM bio-weapons tests Institute scientists carried out on similar furry animals down in the basement. Wilson shuddered.
On one of the other screens, Wilson watched Banger ambling towards Garrison’s lab. When he arrived he keyed the intercom, and Wilson watched him talk into the black box. Banger looked up at the security camera and shrugged, then picked up the phone.
“It’s dead. Want me to take a look?” Banger said. He sounded bored.
“Hang on.”
Wilson brought up the professor’s profile. Developing black paint. Yeah, right.
“He’s not on bio-weapons but I’d take a look through the peephole first.”
“Roger that.”
Wilson watched as Banger slapped the phone back into its cradle. He walked over to the door, put his hand on the peephole cover, and…
Black.
The screen went black. And suddenly Wilson’s control panel was full of flashing red lights. Corridor 4C. The whole ground floor, east wing corridor.
“What the…”
The phone rang and he snapped it up.
“Banger?”
“Nah. Jones. Did you just lose 4C?”
“Yeah. Wait. Shit. I’m losing vision all over the place.”
He clicked on the basement security station, and saw Jones, in front of his monitors. In the background, he could hear the monkeys screaming.
“My hallway just went out,” Jones said. “I’m going to check it out.”
“No!”
But it was too late. Wilson watched as Jones rose from his chair, placing the phone on the desk. He reached out, grabbed the handle, and the screen went black. Wilson pressed the receiver against his ear and squeezed his eyes shut. Nothing. No monkeys screaming. No interference. Just nothing.
Outside, the monochromatic bigwigs were heading for the front door. It was locked, of course, but the Director had a swipe card that would open any door in the building. Wilson clicked through his monitors, watching as one by one they turned black. Then he slapped his hand down on the big, red button, and heard the klaxons sound as the facility was locked down tight.
Wilson watched the secret service agents swarm over the Joint Chiefs of Staff, ushering them back into the waiting limousine. Wilson had his hand on the telephone receiver, waiting for the call. He watched a very pissed off Director fumble a phone out of his pocket. Wilson picked it up on the first ring.
“Dave Wilson, security,” he said, trying to keep the shake out of his voice.
“Wilson, what the hell is going on?”
“We’ve got a bit of a situation here, sir.”
On the screen, the Director looked back at the limousine, now already making its way down the grey gravel driveway. Heads were going to roll for this.
“Do you realise what you’ve done?”
“Sir, we’ve lost most of the building. I can see maybe, five, six rooms. All of the basement is gone.”
“Gone? What do you mean – gone?”
Wilson paused. Truth be told, he didn’t know what he meant. All he knew was that something bad was happening. But he felt what he said was right. It wasn’t just that he couldn’t see it. He felt in his heart that, somehow, it was gone.
“I can’t see it. I can’t hear it,” Wilson said. “The monkeys were screaming sir, and then they were just…” he bit the sentence off before he could say that word again. Gone.
“What are the contaminant readings, Wilson?”
Wilson checked his computer screen. “Flatlining sir, but…”
“No buts, Wilson. You listen to me. We’ve got a funding hearing coming up, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to spend the year flying coach class just because of a few faulty security cameras. Do you understand me?”
“Yes sir.”
“Now you open that front door right now, mister, so that I can try to smooth things over with the Chiefs, or you’ll be filing for welfare come nine am Monday.”
On the monitor, he watched as the director palmed his phone, then walked over to the researchers, who were talking amongst themselves. On the way he offered one final glance out towards the entrance to the facility, but the limousines and humvees were long-gone.
Maybe it would be okay, Wilson thought. He clicked over to the screens he could still see. Life went on. Some of the staff were looking up expectantly at the security monitor, hands on hips, but a lot of them had gone back to work already, despite the braying racket of the klaxons. Wilson checked the airlock behind the front door, and it was still there. The screen hadn’t gone blank. Faulty cameras was what the Director had said. Maybe he was right. One way or another, he was about to find out.
He hit the big, red button again and the klaxons shut down. His eardrums equalised to the silence. The Director slipped his card through the swipe pad and the front door opened. Nothing happened. Wilson let out a long, whistling breath that he didn’t even realise he’d been holding.
The Director strode towards the other door. Normally, the outer door would need to be shut first, but the director had special privileges, as though a GM bug wouldn’t bite his ass just as hard as anybody else’s. He slipped his card through the slot and Wilson started thinking up excuses. He pushed the door.
Everything went black. The screens, the emergency lighting. Everything.
Wilson cried out. For the briefest of moments, he thought he’d blinked out of existence. That he had ceased to be. Laughter bubbled out of him into the darkness but it sounded wrong, feverish, and he bottled it up. He reached out. His desk was still there, and the monitors, the screens still warm under his fingertips. He couldn’t see his hand in front of his face, but that was understandable. The door to the security booth was both light and air proof. Lights out, nobody home, he thought, and another burst of troubled laughter escaped his lips.
He pushed out of his chair, arms out like a sleepwalker. It was okay, he told himself. Something bad was happening but it was okay, he was still here. Any second now the emergency power would kick in and he could start to get things moving again. Call the Pentagon, call the Whitehouse, call the cavalry.
But the emergency power didn’t come on. The room was totally silent. He shuffled over to the door and pressed his ear to it. There was nothing, just the thumping of his own heartbeat. His breathing sounded loud, rasping in and out of his mouth. Was this what had happened in all those rooms? Were the people just waiting, waiting for the lights to come back on. No, he couldn’t believe it. He thought again of the screaming monkeys, the way the phone had just cut off.
And yet, what else could he believe? That the whole world was gone? It started in Professor Garrison’s lab. And it spread. It spread like a virus. No, faster than that. It spread faster than that… like, like light. Or, in this case, darkness. Faster than the speed of dark. Wilson felt the laughter bubbling away inside of him again and he couldn’t stand it, he couldn’t stand the thought of sitting here, laughing into the darkness, waiting. He’d rather face whatever was waiting for him out there.
He put his hand on the doorknob, and turned.
The end.
By Gary Kemble (GrinReaper)
|
