E.D.E.N. EAST - installment 2
Chapter 2 - Imprisoned with Unicorns
After leaving Dr. Halton's office, I was escorted to a small room where I filled out several forms, signed several contracts and was immediately ushered out to a small black car that I was, for all intents and purposes, shoved into. "Are you taking me back to my apartment?" I asked.
"To the airport, actually, where you will be flown directly to Eden East," the driver clarified.
"But what about my things? I need to make arrangements to have my furniture moved, pack my clothes..."
"Oh don't worry, about all of that. It's all being taken care of as we speak. You'll have new clothes waiting for you at the facility. We need you to start right away."
"I see," I said, tapering off at the end. I stared out the window and watched as we drove past several familiar buildings, places I had eaten at, shops where I had bought shoes, even my favorite burrito place, famous for their potato burritos. "I wonder if they'll deliver to Eden?" I pondered out loud.
"I'm sure our burritos are vastly superior to anything that they could come up with," the driver quipped back.
After a long while we finally arrived at a small private airfield where a small private jet sat in front of a large hanger. "Is that what we're taking?" I asked.
"Well, you are, but I'm staying here. I'm just a driver."
"Oh. Okay." I was nervous. I was beginning to wonder what I had gotten myself into. I exited the car and walked over to the open door and ladder on the jet, noting that where windows should be there were instead large opaque ovals of white plastic. "Interesting," I mused.
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"Look, all I'm saying is that I've been here for a month now, and in that time, I haven't seen daylight once!" I was angry.
"Carl, calm down. None of us have seen any daylight. We're here for the work, not a vacation. Besides, how often did you actually get out in your old life?" Dr. Manning set her pen and clipboard down on the table and turned to face me, "I know it's hard at first, but after a while, you just get used to it. Honestly, isn't it a worthy sacrifice to study life forms that no other human has ever seen before?"
"Well, some of these creatures I have seen before, just not outside of a book on mythology. I mean, come on... unicorns?" I laughed, but true enough, we had extracted a large quadrapedal creature resembling a horse with a horn in the middle of its forehead. It was, of course, entirely genetically dissimilar to our horses and it was covered in quills. Then again, everything from this universe seemed to be rather... pointy.
"It's not a unicorn, Carl, and you know that. But, the working theory is that this is the inspiration for the stories." Her voice seemed to be less annoyed with me as she began to describe the natural portals that appear from time to time. Dr. Jennifer Manning was an incredibly intelligent woman who was somewhere in her mid thirties. Her hair was blonde and short, but streaked with silver and her style of dress was utilitarian at best. She took her work very seriously, and it had obviously taken its toll on her already, judging from the creases in her face and the fact that she wore trifocals. Still, she wasn't entirely unattractive, just... cold. I at least felt some emotion while still maintaining a logical perspective. To her, any emotion took away from the purity of the work.
I had been working in this facility for thirty-two days. Thirty-two days without being allowed to step foot outside. Thirty-two days of artificial sunlight to help stave off cabin fever. Thirty-two days of not knowing what state I'm in. Thirty-two days, and I'm starting to understand now that this place isn't what Dr. Donald Halton had described.
I sat there staring at the map of the facility that I had pulled up on my monitor, looking for some sort of temporary escape, when something distracted me from my anger. "Jenn, I have a question."
"Yes?"
"None of the members here have any children, right?"
"That's right. Family distracts from the work."
"So why is there a large room in E sector marked 'nursery, human incubation'?"
After leaving Dr. Halton's office, I was escorted to a small room where I filled out several forms, signed several contracts and was immediately ushered out to a small black car that I was, for all intents and purposes, shoved into. "Are you taking me back to my apartment?" I asked.
"To the airport, actually, where you will be flown directly to Eden East," the driver clarified.
"But what about my things? I need to make arrangements to have my furniture moved, pack my clothes..."
"Oh don't worry, about all of that. It's all being taken care of as we speak. You'll have new clothes waiting for you at the facility. We need you to start right away."
"I see," I said, tapering off at the end. I stared out the window and watched as we drove past several familiar buildings, places I had eaten at, shops where I had bought shoes, even my favorite burrito place, famous for their potato burritos. "I wonder if they'll deliver to Eden?" I pondered out loud.
"I'm sure our burritos are vastly superior to anything that they could come up with," the driver quipped back.
After a long while we finally arrived at a small private airfield where a small private jet sat in front of a large hanger. "Is that what we're taking?" I asked.
"Well, you are, but I'm staying here. I'm just a driver."
"Oh. Okay." I was nervous. I was beginning to wonder what I had gotten myself into. I exited the car and walked over to the open door and ladder on the jet, noting that where windows should be there were instead large opaque ovals of white plastic. "Interesting," I mused.
--------------
"Look, all I'm saying is that I've been here for a month now, and in that time, I haven't seen daylight once!" I was angry.
"Carl, calm down. None of us have seen any daylight. We're here for the work, not a vacation. Besides, how often did you actually get out in your old life?" Dr. Manning set her pen and clipboard down on the table and turned to face me, "I know it's hard at first, but after a while, you just get used to it. Honestly, isn't it a worthy sacrifice to study life forms that no other human has ever seen before?"
"Well, some of these creatures I have seen before, just not outside of a book on mythology. I mean, come on... unicorns?" I laughed, but true enough, we had extracted a large quadrapedal creature resembling a horse with a horn in the middle of its forehead. It was, of course, entirely genetically dissimilar to our horses and it was covered in quills. Then again, everything from this universe seemed to be rather... pointy.
"It's not a unicorn, Carl, and you know that. But, the working theory is that this is the inspiration for the stories." Her voice seemed to be less annoyed with me as she began to describe the natural portals that appear from time to time. Dr. Jennifer Manning was an incredibly intelligent woman who was somewhere in her mid thirties. Her hair was blonde and short, but streaked with silver and her style of dress was utilitarian at best. She took her work very seriously, and it had obviously taken its toll on her already, judging from the creases in her face and the fact that she wore trifocals. Still, she wasn't entirely unattractive, just... cold. I at least felt some emotion while still maintaining a logical perspective. To her, any emotion took away from the purity of the work.
I had been working in this facility for thirty-two days. Thirty-two days without being allowed to step foot outside. Thirty-two days of artificial sunlight to help stave off cabin fever. Thirty-two days of not knowing what state I'm in. Thirty-two days, and I'm starting to understand now that this place isn't what Dr. Donald Halton had described.
I sat there staring at the map of the facility that I had pulled up on my monitor, looking for some sort of temporary escape, when something distracted me from my anger. "Jenn, I have a question."
"Yes?"
"None of the members here have any children, right?"
"That's right. Family distracts from the work."
"So why is there a large room in E sector marked 'nursery, human incubation'?"