Beast Machine (37 page)

Now, what does the mine
look like under the control of the reclusive billionaire, Chairman
Obelis?

It’s a spotless – as
spotless as a mining facility can be – facility that procures coal
deep from the mines and resembles more of a museum from the outside
than a coal facility because of the architecture. It was a smooth
and unassuming building from the outside, but contained the
technology within to keep the miners safe and the pollution
nonexistent.

The miners were overjoyed
after learning the mine would reopen, but had no idea how
immaculate, modern, and safe their place of employment would
become. No longer were they forced to wear broken helmets; no
longer were they forced to pray to their respective God when using
the elevator; and no longer were they given nearly empty oxygen
tanks. It was as if the local community had collectively won the
lottery. Their fortunes and luck had finally changed.

Since Chairman Obelis
reopened the coal mine several months ago, there have been zero
deaths, zero work-related amputations, and there have been zero
chemicals or wastewater leaked into the water tables. Was this
because the workers appreciated this new facility and all the fancy
safety tools they were given?

Absolutely not.

They were still drunks and
intense drug users, which is why Chairman Obelis didn’t open the
mine until the majority of the miners had the Carda Implant placed
into their brain stems. He wasn’t going to trust a herd of braying
donkeys in that coal mine, no matter how safe it was, because he
couldn’t risk a person dying. Aside from a select few
dangerous
individuals,
every single life, no matter how insignificant the life was in the
grand scheme of things, mattered to Chairman Obelis. Healthy and
non-injured employees wouldn’t hurt his public appearance. That
would be meaningless political fluff only for those outside
Arkansas once the Carda Implants were inside each Arkansans’ brain
stem, however.

Problems still arose at the
mining facility since humans aren’t perfect, not even the ones with
the Carda Implant. Miners occasionally would be burned by the
chemicals used to get to the coal; they would catch their fingers
in the elevator shaft; and they would, infrequently, faint from
exhaustion because they thought they could work longer than they
ought to work. These small time injuries normally would have taken
the miners out of commission for too long, but with the Carda
Implants they overcame the pain and would only seek medical
attention when they
knew
it was urgent.

Generally, though, the work
environment was perfect for miners since there was essentially no
way that they would die from faulty machinery or a mine collapsing.
Their only real threat was their minds.

“
Hey, Bernie!” shouted a
man in his blue mining uniform and an orange hardhat. “How was last
night?”

“
It was splendid,” replied,
presumably, Bernie. Bernie had a yellow hardhat. “My wife still
enjoys the redneck things in life, but I thoroughly enjoyed the
wine and the musical. The drive to Little Rock wasn’t even that
bad! Our hybrid got incredible gas mileage.”

“
Glad to hear it!” The
orange hardhat wearing man slapped Bernie on the back and both men
laughed. They both walked toward the entrance of the mining
facility, yet to be opened.

A large gathering of
miners, each with an orange, yellow, blue or white hardhat on their
heads, had beaten the two men to the entrance of the mining
facility, but this was not unusual at all. The miners all typically
arrived between 5:05 am – 5:25 am; the main mine entrance gate
would open automatically at 5:30 am and the day would begin. The
miners would either have idle conversation or check to make sure
all their safety gear was up to date and working like it should. A
lack of camaraderie amongst the miners became noticeable during
work duties, unfortunately, as each miner was programmed to do
their job once the morning gate opened. No more small talk, no more
jokes and no more non-work related activities, aside from a thirty
minute lunch at 11:30 am. They would ignore every outside problem
until the day was over at 5:30 pm.

As the miners were waiting
for the entrance to open and their day to begin, one of their
coworkers, a stout man with red stitching in his blue uniform
reading ‘Carver,’ flung his hardhat straight into the air. Nearby
miners noticed the hardhat rise through the air and watched it hit
–
PLOOMP
– the
ground. No reactions or words were made regarding the hardhat being
tossed into the air. This Carver had apparently been known to be
dramatic and the workers knew that they had to focus on the work
day that was about to begin.

“
How can none of you hear
the voices?” shouted Carver rabidly. His hair was thinning and his
mind was becoming warped. “They’re so fucking loud! I can barely
hear myself think!” He fell to his knees and began to scream
gutturally. The screams were similar to a dying oxen or the roars
of a dying lion; sounds that would inflict quite a large amount of
emotional pain on any sentient organism. Disturbing sounds that
would
surely
bring
out even the slightest kindness in the most focused, work-first
individuals.

Except that not a single
miner came to the aid of Carver. He was left screaming and
hollering to himself and the voices. No miner even really noticed
the poor man screaming his life out. They just kept making their
idle conversation and checking their safety equipment. Their lack
of care toward others outside of work seems to come from their
constant lack of human empathy during work times. The Carda Implant
was adapting differently than expected inside each of the
miners.

BING-DONG-BING

The entrance to the mine
opened and all the miners shuffled in, except for Carver. He was
still writhing, shouting and crying. His hair, or what was left of
it, fell onto the ground by his own hands.

“
Please,” he cried.
“Someone stop and take me to get help. My mind isn’t right.” He
tried to grasp the hands of the passing miners but they kept
shuffling by too quickly for Carver to even get the slightly grip
on them. “Please, please! My mind, it’s talking to me. Telling me I
should kill myself. Please help. I don’t know what to
do!”

All the miners had entered
the facility and the door closed a minute after all the miners had
entered. It would lock tight in twenty-nine minutes.

“
I should listen to my mind
then, I guess,” said Carver, tears streaming down his face. He
blinked slowly twice. His mind kept torturing him. “I’m clearly
sick and no one wants to help. I can’t be saved.” He rounded up
enough strength in his body to prop himself up and gripped his
pickaxe, one of the few miners that still equipped such a tool. He
launched the pickaxe straight into his skull as powerfully as he
could. The pickaxe only entered a few inches into his skull, but it
was more than enough to cause significant damage to his
brain.

Blood started to pour out
of Carver’s punctured skull, as Carver stood still. Emotionally
still. A smile came across his face. He fell to the earth and bled
out as the other miners made their way deep below the
Earth.

Chapter 34
Connecting The Dots

“Hello, there – to all you
people listening in! We would like to welcome you – hopefully
welcome you back! – to the Jimbo and Elliot Session on ADDR out of
Portland!”
said Elliot as jazzy, electronic
intro music played behind his relaxed voice.

“
This Jimbo and Elliot
Session is sponsored by Silva’s primo nose filters! If you work
around hazardous materials, toxic smoke or you have bad allergies,
you should try Silva’s nose primo filters! Scientifically proven to
prevent any toxic material or allergens to enter your nasal
passages! Contact your doctor today,”
Elliot coughed,
“Excuse me for that
cough, folks. Anyhow, I’d like to start the show by saying that we
have had a serious tone on the show the past few weeks because of a
local scientist’s gruesome death. It’s just been an awful, awful
few weeks for the community at large. We want to get back to our
fun, wacky radio hour here on the Jimbo and Elliot
Session!”

“
I wouldn’t say it’s been
too awful, Elliot,”
replied Jimbo.
“In fact, I’d bet some listeners like this sorta
thing.”

“
Why would they?”
asked Elliot.

“
I mean, it’s absolutely
terrible that Dr. Spotila died – especially the way he died – but
it’s been interesting, incredible really, how we learned so much
about what was going on in that gaudy, ritzy, expensive tower of
his. Or should I say dungeon,”
said
Jimbo.

“
Well, I suppose some
people – including you – may like to talk about this sort of thing,
but should we kick a man while he’s down?”
said Elliot.
“It was, uh, cool, I
suppose, to have a serious tone in the show, but I’m just not sure
we should keep piling onto the guy. He’s dead, Jimbo.”

“
So what? He’s fucking
dead!”
said Jimbo excitedly.
“Pardon my French to everyone listening that may
have been offended just there – my producer is giving me a death
stare – but, come on Elliot, he’s dead. He doesn’t have any
immediate family, so we’re really not piling on anyone but the dead
reptile lover, Dr. Spotila.”

“
I just don’t know,
Jimbo,”
said Elliot.
“There are so many more things to talk about – like that wacky
governor’s race in the backwards state of Arkansas! Or how Mickey
Rourke swam the English Channel nude, or we could talk about if Joe
Flacco is actually elite, or how the Portland city council wants to
try to officially trademark ‘The 90s’ for their own usage in the
city! There’s much more to talk about than some dead herpetologist,
despite him being from Portland.”

“
Let’s just talk about it
this one last time, but we’ll leave out the security guard that was
killed,”
said Jimbo.
“He didn’t do anything to anyone and his case is still being
investigated, though the current theory is that a wild animal got
to him. They still haven’t found any trace of those circus freaks.
Maybe the video was old? Spotila didn’t apparently care much about
his own building’s security.”

“
Fine,”
said Elliot.
“You’re way too into this
thing, but I’ll let you have your way this one last time. I’ll get
my way one day.”
Elliot sighed
loudly.

“
ME LIKEY!”
said an eccentric man’s voice. It was a reaction
button at the radio station that Jimbo pushed.

“
What exactly do you want
to discuss?”
said Elliot.
“We’ve covered a lot of what went down
already.”

“
Well, first I wanted to
mention an update on the device, erm serum, er what’s it
called?”
asked Jimbo. “
The thingie Dr. Spotila was working on, supposed to help
mankind?”

“
Uh, erm. I think, uh. An
apparatus? I think?”
replied
Elliot.

“
Yes!”
said Jimbo loudly.
“That apparatus he
was working on will be continued by his colleagues at the American
Scientific Hub, or ASH for short. The apparatus, if you haven’t
been keeping up with our show – shame on you – the apparatus, in
simple terms for simple people like me, is taking the cellular
structures from lizards’ tails that regenerate and creating human
body parts made out of those cells. The body parts would be arms,
legs, fingers, toes, ears, maybe eyes, and hopefully eventually
internal organs!”

“
I’d like to let everyone
know that Jimbo read that information off a note card!”
Jimbo laughed at the revelation from Elliot.
“
But, honestly, I don’t think Dr. Spotila
was going to go that far, Jimbo,”
said
Elliot coolly.
“I believe it was going to
be meant for wounded veterans, children from war torn countries,
and those afflicted by being born limbless.”

“
Hey, El, a man can
speculate, right? I know he was just working on it for those born
without limbs, or had limbs taken away somehow, but just imagine
the possibilities that this apparatus could eventually lead
to!”
rambled Jimbo.
“My Sci-fi boner is going off the charts!”

A loud
“BOING-OING-OING”
sound blasted over
the radio.

“
So what’s your point in
all this? Why are we bringing this back up? Just to talk about some
apparatus he could have made, but now someone else is going to try
to make? To talk about science fiction becoming science
fact?”
asked Elliot, clearly
agitated.
“Make your point now.”

“
All right, all right. Calm
down, El,”
said Jimbo.
“My point is that one of the scientists from ASH that was
appointed to oversee the continuation of the apparatus was found
dead just a few days ago.”

“
What!?”
said Elliot.
“Who? No,
you’re lying. Tell me you’re lying. You’re just saying this to keep
talking about Dr. Spotila.”