Act 1
Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics
Two systems that are in thermal equilibrium with a third system are also in thermal equilibrium with each other.
The Human Contradiction
Two men who like the same woman will not like each other. Two women who like the same man will not like each other.
And so we go…
Chapter 1
Why couldn’t anyone else see what I did? Too often, people averted eyes, stammered nonsense, and slid away. Their prized genius had lost control. I’d come to the archives Monday morning seeking privacy because I shouldn’t be the only person seeing odd things. I might be going nuts, but I wasn’t stupid and I feared insanity. I’d hoped my new job would to give me a new start but I’d said what I’d seen and I was more alone than ever.
Twelve inches from my face I saw a snake, no, two snakes — one sleeping, all flesh and venom, and the other moving, all plastic and poison. Which was real?
Maybe Roland could help. We lived in the same ozone and he’d understand — he didn’t have friends either. Was he seeing strange things but smart enough to stay mum?
I’m a research chemist and a damned good one. Zern Industries had placed me in charge of the lab but now locked me out. Someone was scared for their new forty-story tower and held my history against me — two minor lab explosions and one factory toasted. The snakes and I shared a murky atmosphere on the twenty-fifth floor.
I’d uncovered them in a crate labeled Exothermic Reactions, 1873-1900. Exothermic means releasing heat — as dynamite has been known to do. I backed off and bumped into a box which emitted a rattle. I dropped the penlight from my mouth. Shit! Why not hold up a sign saying “Bite me?”
“Mr. Charles, answer your cell!” I recoiled from a voice coming from behind me. She’d had lots of space to sneak up on me — each floor of the archives covered a full city block. “Do you care how many creepy floors I had to visit to find you?”
My visitor gave me an opportunity to test my visual acuity and sanity. I waved my guest forward and stepped aside to make room in front of the snakes. She was in her early twenties with a nose ring and orange hair. Her thong undies popping up over her jeans emphasized her I don’t need this job attitude. She was the perfect choice to be the Third Assistant to the Associate Vice-President of Human Resources of a multi-billion dollar chemical company. I named her Wimpy.
She peered over the crate’s edge and ran to safety.
Time for my sanity confirmation. The issue had become the centerpiece of my days and nights. “What did you see?”
She retreated another step, cell at the ready. “A snake.”
She’d offered a direct answer but not what I needed to hear. My critical question. “How many?”
“One. What’s wrong with you?”
The mechanical snake disappeared in a puff of nothingness.
Wrong? I wished I knew. Better get her to go before she asks again. “Why’re you here?”
She spoke with a whine as if reasoning with a child. “Mr. Charles, I need a character reference.”
I was seeing things. Again. What was the question? A character reference? “On who?”
“LaMarr LaBrosse.”
The snake stirred, raising dust I could taste. Pffft. “Never heard of him.”
“He knows you well. You know him as LD50.”
My sphincter went spastic and my brain back-flipped. LD50 stood for Lethal Dose 50%. How much chemical did you feed the rats before 50% of them died? The son-of-a bitch had tried to kill me. Why the fuck was he applying for work with Zern?
A six-inch spotted snake slithered out of the box at my feet and moved easterly. Rounded head, not triangular, it might be real. I danced around it. “Don’t hire him.”
Clouds moved and a shaft of light made the floating dust particles sparkle. A two-foot long solid-brown snake joined the short one. I had no idea where it had come from or if it was venomous. I was scared to ask if she saw it.
Wimpy had a job to do. “Who we hire isn’t your decision. Do you think he’s Green?”
Does the asshole use biodegradable bullets? Does he employ free-range gunpowder? Does he ride a bicycle to work?
“He’s as Green as any assassin who specializes in chemical company execs.”
“Thank you. Second question: Does he work well with others?”
Nobody but me lived to say yes or no. “I haven’t heard any complaints.”
The first snake dropped four feet to the floor with a light plop and followed its brethren. It was around eighteen inches long, including rattles. Crap. I’d stumbled into the accounting department.
“Wonderful. Last question: Did you ever rate his performance and review it with him?”
I’d rated his henchman as a zero and blown him to hell. “I never had the opportunity.”
A fourth snake, three feet long with rattles, dropped out of the Exothermic Reactions crate and moved west. I should have seen it earlier. Were my delusions hiding the real world?
Whoa! Stop and reason. A mechanical viper? No, something is in my head. Did I contract it at Zern?
But Wimpy hadn’t seen it either. I was trapped by snakes. Why hadn’t I been warned about them? The shelving was seven feet tall, metal, and placed in rows four feet apart. I tiptoed on an imaginary center line, afraid to lean one way or the other.
“You’ve been a great help. Have a good day.”
Way to go, Babe, run and leave me hanging. “Hold it. Why are you talking to a killer?”
“Your office has new bullet scars.”
“Scars?
“Shots from street level.”
Crap. My stomach knotted. If I released the formulas the shooter wanted, he’d kill me for the joy of it. “Why me?”
“We have to protect your research.” She disappeared faster than my last date.
Those damned fuel additives had surfaced again. I’d tried to save the world and now more people wanted me dead than alive. The company I’d been working for had been bought by Zern, who had relocated us with other acquisitions into their new building in Portland, Oregon. Our companies didn’t like each other much, but it was early and we had lots of time for real animosity to surface.
As for my window, I’d been shot at before but the rest of the company hadn’t. The word of the new attack had gnarled my gut but I hadn’t wanted Wimpy to see. I didn’t want anyone to know about the quivering gelatin I turned into when guns were fired at me.
A mouse broke for freedom and the brown snake nailed it before I could flinch — reminding me of the first time I’d heard the offer, “I’m from the government and here to help.” The other two stayed in place. Great. They remained between me and the exit. Or were they?
I heard a siren. If someone targeted me through the window I couldn’t dodge in the narrow way between seven-foot tall racks and snakes plugged the exits.
My cell rang, showing a face I wanted to see — Joseph DelaRosa, thick white hair and a trimmed white mustache — a fellow chemist who was about to depart through retirement.
I didn’t know if snakes could hear, but I lowered my voice. “Joe, I need help.”
Joe’s baritone boomed. “Why are you whispering, Compadre?”
“I’m surrounded by snakes and I know they don’t have ears but that doesn’t mean they can’t hear me.”
“Of course they can hear you, Amigo. Don’t say anything demeaning.”
I smelled something rotting — either dead mice or a chemist who’d pissed off a snake. “Very funny. Which acquisition sent us snakes with their files?”
“Don’t get paranoid. We put them there ourselves.”
Another mouse popped out and the small snake grabbed it. The mini-viper dragged the mouse out of sight, presumably to swallow it. The action reminded me of the business universe.
I wanted to climb an invisible rope to the next floor. “Why?”
Joe didn’t take my hint and whisper. “To handle the rodent problem the phosphate people sent with their archives.”
“Now you’re paranoid. Those are nice folks.”
“They’ve conned you.”
Conned, me? Not a chance. Only a girlfriend could do that — but I was thirty-five, never married and with zero prospects. I’d love to be lovingly conned. “Why not set mousetraps?”
“Haven’t you heard the news? We’re Green. Snakes are nature’s balance.”
“How do I get out of here?”
“Easy. Log in to a website of gerbils screwing and they’ll rally round.”
The short snake’s remaining buddy had coiled and laid his head looking straight at me as if planning how to swallow a six-three idiot in a white lab coat. I wished it could blink. “Fine. I think. Do you know where to find one?”
“Watch your mail.”
Joe disconnected and seconds later my cell notified me of a message. Joe must have had the site on his favorites menu. I tuned in and gerbils’ squeals inundated me. I jacked up the volume and then slid the cell as far away as I could. The snakes rushed to their prey.
Sprinting to the elevator, I ran for my life. I passed an opened box marked “Poisons.” Now what? What junior grade Lucrezia Borgia was snooping? When I reached my office, I planned to call the brown-nosing junior exec who’d locked me out of the lab and send her to retrieve my cell.
I had resolved my uncertainty. I had confirmed I was entertaining visions shared by no one else — in my case a mechanical snake built with plastic blocks, motors, a battery pack, and external hydraulics. What had gotten to me — a drug? I had to clarify my reality before I stepped out a high window for an imaginary elevator ride or a pilot dosed with the same stuff tried to land his plane in my office.
If I could see imaginary snakes, why couldn’t I conjure a date with a fantasy woman?
