Frank emerges from the forest and arrives at the clearing, at the edge of the fenced-off Wildlife Ventures facility.
Even though the stampeding animals had broken through the gate and the fence in different spots yesterday, both were already patched up, albeit haphazardly.
He takes the ID card from his left pants pocket and hangs it on his neck while walking towards the checkpoint at the gate.
The two guards stationed there, in full military gear, spot his approach from afar and look his way.
“Heya, Jack, Jill,” Frank greets as he gets close enough.
“If it isn’t Frank, any luck out there?”
Jack asks adjusting his cap, a green and brown camouflage texture covering it, his right hand resting on his weapon’s stock.
“I’m, afraid not.” Frank shrugs.
“So what brings you back? I think the boss man’s orders were: ‘Don’t come back until you’ve captured it’.”
Jill grills him with a grin, drilling into Frank’s soul with an intense stare of her amber eyes.
“And you seem to have returned empty-handed.”
“That’s just it, I was hoping to talk to him about it.”
“Is that so?”
Jack settles the cap into a downward angle hiding his gray eyes, then looks down at Frank from below the rim of his cap with a look of superiority.
“How brazen, how utterly foolish,” Jill scoffs and rolls her eyes, throwing her light brown short hair around dramatically with a flick of her hand.
The guards and Frank stare at each other for a while in silence.
...
“Hah, sorry Frank, I just love giving you a hard time,” Jack speaks up first.
“Of course, we’ll let you in.”
A slight smile creeps up on his usually expressionless face.
Frank puts both of his hands in his pockets and takes out the Applenuts, tossing one to Jack.
“Wha- why didn’t you lead with these if you got them?” Jack deftly catches the fruit with his left hand.
Frank then throws the other one to Jill.
“Damn Frank, making us look soft,” Jill pouts and looks away, catching the fruit without looking at it.
“Hah, keep up the good work,” Frank grins at them both.
The pair groans and rolls their eyes at him as Jack slides the iron fence gate open, slightly bulkier than the surrounding fence.
Frank walks through into the facility’s grounds, they close the gate after him with a rattle.
The main entrance’s large steel double doors are bumpy and dented from being torn down and stomped under the Foxbears’ feet just the other day.
They don’t seem to close quite right anymore, but at least his colleagues have managed to prop them up again.
On his right, on the far end of the fenced facility is a separate building, a block of flats, the on-site residence of all other employees, or well everyone but the boss and him.
The manager of this location lived in the main building, in a separate penthouse-esque space above the first floor of the facility facility.
The facility itself is just one floor, the ground floor, but makes up for it in sheer size and a very high indoor ceiling.
He enters through the heavy door, it squeaks and drags against the ground as he pushes it open.
A faint smell of smoke irritates his nostrils.
Maybe they should have waited to patch the roof and the walls to make sure all the smoke got out first…
The doors open straight into the large open space of the animal cages.
He strains to close the doors, and after managing it, he sets out for the employee dressing rooms to the right.
He walks along the bleak corridor of gray and grayer, cement floors and metal walls, at least all the actual workspaces are cozier.
Passing by some colleagues on the way, he gives them a wave or a nod if he’s at least acquaintances with them.
Only a few of them return the gesture, others cringe and ignore him the best they can.
He pushes open the door to the men’s locker room, six neat rows of lockers form small corridors in the room, with long benches between them and on the back wall.
Here the walls are actually wood and covered with light blue paint, even the floor is yellow tiles, although the color is starting to fade.
Seemingly nobody else is present, so he goes directly to his locker, opening it with his ID which also functions as a key card.
He starts undressing from his usual clothes and changes to the formal suit he was forced to wear at work.
Frank doesn't hate this manner of wear, in fact, he feels he looks quite fetching in a suit, it's just that it's far too stiff and impractical to use, if not for that, he'd use one more willingly.
He had gotten some looks from the ladies at the workplace the first few days of his promotion and outfit swap, leading him to think this way, but in reality, those could have meant anything.
Maybe they mocked him for his long hair as it even more prominently contrasted against these fine clothes.
He had recently been promoted to 'auction organizer', hence the suit.
Though he still kept his old responsibility of photographing the animals, as he had basically been doing half the work of an upper-level job, for a long time before getting promoted.
He missed feeding and otherwise taking care of the animals himself, however.
Having to deal with auction organizers and customers remotely, or even on-site, did not compare to taking care of the exotic alien animals.
Even if their time together was brief, only a few days, sometimes weeks, before they were shipped off to buyers or factories, it was still the best part of the job.
“If it isn’t Frank the Alien Whisperer,” The voice of Pablo rings on his left.
“What brings you here, didn’t the boss basically banish you for what went down on your last shift? Or did you already catch the thing?”
“I’m working on it,” Frank quickly responds as he pulls up the suit’s trousers.
“Hah, you better be, I’m amazed you had the balls to come back without it, don’t think I’ve ever seen him so angry!”
The man with a chestnut complexion booms with his low bass voice.
“Well, his face wasn’t even half as red as five years ago when he shouted so much he lost his voice for a week.”
Frank adjusts his god-awful green tie with yellow stripes running down it in acute angles while looking at the mirror of his locker.
“Damn, what a blessed week-after that must have been, was it due to the Mosquitollibri debacle?”
“No, it was even earlier than that, nobody even talks of it as they fear they’ll get overheard by management.”
Satisfied with the state of his tie and dress shirt he puts on the suit’s coat and turns to Pablo.
“Oh man, I need to know exactly what happened!” The gossiper of the workplace exclaims with a glint in his dark brown eyes.
“Well, I’ll tell you some other time, I’m quite busy now,” Frank gives Pablo a mischievous smile while buttoning up his coat.
He turns back to the locker, grabbing his camera from the top shelf as well as his hat, placing them on the bench below, before locking it up.
“Well alright, good luck Frank, if anyone can survive this, it’s you. He wouldn’t dare to just fire the longest employed employee.”
Frank lifts the camera from the bench and hangs it around his neck from its strap, followed by perching the flat hat, accompanying the attire, on his head.
He wasn’t sure what the point of it was, but maybe it made him look more presentable.
“Hah, I wouldn’t be so sure, but thanks Pablo.”
Frank heads out of the dressing room, leaving Pablo behind, who hadn’t yet managed to do any changing himself.
He continues down the corridor on the right of the dressing rooms, to the cafeteria, situated after another right turn.
Alright, after I’ve eaten, hmm, where should I start?
Maybe the shipping manifest of Amethyst’s ship? It should say where they hauled off her Mother’s body.
He joins the queue for the cafeteria’s self-service counter, there's some employees here even though Frank arrived at an unusual time.
The cafeteria received constant patronage throughout the day due to the work times being flexible, you could start and end your day whenever and take breaks as much as you like, as long as the job got done.
Though if the boss caught you lazing around too much you’d likely get assigned more work.
I hope I don’t run into him, easier to snoop around without him breathing down my neck.
Gotta eat fast and then get on it.
He buys a lizard stew and a lizard meat sandwich, the Viridian Centizard is a plentiful and also a good tasting source of food, so it's used widely in many dishes.
It's also their number one export, one of the few legal ones.
He sits down at an empty table and starts sipping the soup, getting to enjoy only a fleeting moment of peace.
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“Enjoying your last supper?” A voice, too familiar, grates Frank’s ears.
“How’s it going, Rocco?”
“Oh, on a first-name basis are we? Last time I checked you still hadn’t recaptured that Tyrchid, so it’s Mr. Crondeston to you.”
His boss sits on the same table, directly in front of Frank.
“Fine, Crondeston, whatever, why do you need it back so badly anyway? You never told me the reason,” Frank spoons up soup and takes a bite of his bread on top.
“Because, you don’t need to know anything else than that we need it, and this time your job will actually be on the line.”
Rocco’s elbows are on the table, his fingers interlocked, he leans his jaw to his thumbs like some overlord, sizing up Frank.
Hah, how many times has he said that to me by now?
“You never assign anyone to retrieve the escaped animals? Why now?
Is there something special about this one? Is it especially dangerous to the ecosystem?"
“Well, I- no, you are getting nothing out of me!" Rocco rises from his slouch on the table and crosses his arms.
"Is it... valuable?” Frank asks with a grin.
L-like I’d tell you, need I remind you that nosiness is up there for punishment along with betrayal and failure”
Bingo.
“In the transport that it arrived in, there was another one, larger, right? Do you know where it is, can I see it?”
The bald, slightly pudgy man scoffs loudly.
“Of course I know where it is and no you cannot see it”
“Why? It would be very beneficial, I could analyze the contents of its digestive tract, see what it eats, where I’d likely find it, see what kind of climate and areas it prefers...”
“Would you now? The answer is still no.”
“What? I thought you wanted me to find this thing?”
Frank raises his voice a little and leans forward, quickly swiping his long blond hair back, before they soak in his stew.
“I do. But I can’t show it even if I wanted to, it has already been sent to HQ.
You should have come up with this strategy sooner,” Rocco smiles contentedly as he speaks.
What? Why would Headquarters want it…?
Frank leans back on his seat.
“Well, that’s unfortunate... I guess I’ll have to make do without it.”
“You better.” He raises his head and wags a finger at Frank.
“I suggest you finish your slop and get back to it immediately if you know what’s good for you,” Rocco says sternly, his face tinting a bit red already as he stands up.
“Well, I still have some more pictures to take for tomorrow’s auction, as well as dealing with some of our VIP clients, I can’t be neglecting my duties even if I’ve been assigned to retrieval.”
Frank stares at Rocco’s blue eyes.
“Ah,” Rocco’s smug demeanor changes completely.
“Did I ever tell you how I admire your diligence, everyone else should follow your example. People like you have a bright future ahead of you here in the IWV”
Rocco walks around the table as he speaks and slaps Frank on the shoulder.
“Keep up the great work.”
He saunters away and leaves the cafeteria.
Rocco is always Rocco…
Frank downs the rest of the banaorange juice and cleans the remaining stew, getting up from the table, the wooden chair moves backward with a screech.
Alright then, since I promised…
First, my actual work.
Frank sets out to work, efficiently going through the cages housing animals that still need pictures taken from them, the warehouse side was mostly in order again, though the burned stack of boxes hadn’t been cleaned up yet.
Frank makes his way to his work computer, situated in a room on the left side of the facility with other office spaces separated by thin movable walls.
He uploads the pictures from his camera and organizes them on their black market igweb (Intergalactic web) page.
He jots down the descriptions and details of each animal, as well as the starting bid prices so that it's ready to go live tomorrow.
A fair bit of the merchandise has to be unlisted for having escaped, surprisingly, the Tyrchid seemed to not have made this auction list in the first place.
Once that’s done he has a few video calls with VIP customers and live auction organizers about upcoming stock. Frank hated this part of the job, sucking up to some millionaire’s whims.
But at least some of them seemed to be taking care of the animals, as they frequently asked him for tips on how to best treat them, as well as for advice when they got sick or had some other issues.
Those people weren't too bad, he was happy to lend his knowledge each time.
Frank then sends some emails and inquiries to legitimate businesses and their factory lines about their need and demand for Centizard products, the end of the email signature he was obligated to use ticked him off each time he saw it.
“Eat you when I meet you” -slogan, with a green cartoon Centizard lizard wearing a wizard hat, cape, and wielding a wand.
Underneath this farce his employee name and number so their customers know who they are dealing with.
Their marketing department had had a breakthrough by advertising their products with this Centizard wizard cartoon mascot called Cenzard, their products' demand had skyrocketed after the first ad campaign, which had been steadily growing ever since.
Cenzard’s whole shtick is about fighting with magic against the evil Centizards depicted as their real-life counterparts and saving the day by turning them into food products.
While often getting comically confused to his non-intelligent food product kin and ending in all sorts of misunderstandings.
Frank isn’t happy about the undertones of this marketing, a species voluntarily and happily selling out its kin, which didn’t seem to bother the public at all.
But it’s not like such nonsensical marketing hadn’t been done in the past before, with cartoon characters depicting products committing cannibalism or other heinous acts.
...
Maybe it isn't wise to think too hard about the underlying crazy world of ads...
Ugh, enough about getting upset about this crap again...
He checks when the next scheduled flights, both automatic and manually flown, in and out of the base are, refining the search results with “Destination: Midnight Iris”.
There’s one ship leaving today… 1 hour(s) ago.
They sent in a ship there, today!?
He checks the passenger list, 15 people from security, and… every single one of their researchers?
Why would they suddenly send so many to a mining outpost of our sister company?
He was going to check the work list next to see if the researchers were still working in the lab, but now he wouldn’t need to even do that.
He suddenly remembers and checks the clock. Rocco should be having his afternoon feast right about now.
Phew, just in time, I should have a small window to go around without him monitoring me from the cameras.
Frank gets up from his workstation and inconspicuously makes his way down the halls and to the Lab, only a few doors away from their offices, also on the left side.
He arrives at the double doors of the lab and cracks open the right one, the lights are out. Only the faint blue glow of monitors and some machinery lights up the room.
He steps into the room and turns on the lights, long fluorescent lamp tubes blink into full glow.
The door closes the way behind him with a swaying back-and-forth motion, soon coming to a halt.
Alright, let’s see…
He first checks the four computers in the room, all of them are locked up and password-protected.
If only it was that easy.
Frank opts to search through the last computer's desk instead, ruffling through the numerous papers around, reading their headlines.
Finding papers detailing a Giraffeduck feather pillow ad campaign and the scientific benefits of sleeping on such pillows.
Another one on… Centizard toothpaste…
Ew.
A draft of Cenzard holding a toothbrush in place of his wand is doodled to the side of the paper.
Finally, he finds a promising paper:
'Foxbear fur's usage in house construction as insulation'.
He quickly glances through the research, it's actually really interesting, delving deep into the numbers and reasons as to why it's better than any existing insulation.
He decides to keep the info in mind in case he ever builds another house.
That table being a bust, he glances around again, spotting a workspace on the far left, with a centrifuge on it, next to a fridge.
Papers lay on it too, one with very faint green stains.
He hurries to the table and picks up the paper, avoiding the green, dried liquid.
The title reads:
“The properties of Tyrchid blood and substance P.”
He reads through the whole thing, it lists in great detail how they researched the blood that first seemed to be useless, not reacting with anything until they combined it with the purple liquid inside of a separate vein system and glands in the Tyrchid’s body, substance P.
The combination of these two was an explosive ball of fire, igniting immediately.
They ran some tests on the details of this new combination and found it to be much more combustive, burning much longer and hotter than currently used top-grade spaceship fuel.
A certain segment in the paper especially strikes him:
“With careful handling and combination of these two substances inside a durable enough rocket engine, it could up their fuel efficiency by 540,27% and their overall output by 1768,61%.
This fuel source would also be renewable as it comes from an organic species, a challenge mankind and the rest of the galaxies have struggled with since time immemorial.
However, no such rocket engine currently exists that could withstand the full combustion of these two substances in a closed space.
Further research is needed on the optimal storage and preservation of this blood and substance P.
Fresher blood and in much larger quantities are required to accomplish this.”
At the bottom of the page, a signature of Rocco Crondeston authorizes further research, dated yesterday evening.
By the Red Goddess! They sent an expedition on Midnight Iris, to harvest the Tyrchid’s blood?
The blood of Amethyst’s family?
Somebody clears their throat behind him loudly.
Frank quickly drops the paper on the table and turns to see Rocco in the doorway.
“And just what do you think you are doing?” He eyes him suspiciously, blocking both of the double doors with his body.
“I... decided to see if the researchers had happened to have any notes of their own about the behavior, habitat, or diet of Tyrchids.
Unfortunately, none of them were present and I didn’t want to wait for tomorrow, so I took the initiative.” Frank spouts half-lies trying to remain calm and believable.
“You know how they are, always so early to get to work, when you’d need them in the evening they are never present.”
“Yes, of course, quite so. Did you find anything to help in its capture?”
“Well according to this paper, their blood is green, and I do think it was injured so that’s a pretty good lead.
I do remember spotting some splatter resembling the shade on this paper earlier in the woods, so I think I better get on her trail fast before it moves to another location.”
Frank quickly makes his argument.
“Oh, very good then, please do hurry on tracking her down,” Rocco says, awfully calm and cooperative.
Frank starts walking towards Rocco as calmly and normally as possible, intending to make his exit.
As he approaches, Rocco gives Frank way.
“Have a good evening sir,” Frank says as casually as possible when he is about to pass him.
“Likewise,” Rocco’s gaze is fixated on him, through his squinted eyes he evaluates Frank as he passes him and exits through the left door.
Frank walks away from the lab with a quick gait, glancing behind on occasion, as he makes his way to his computer.
Nobody seems to be tailing him, but it's hard to tell in the badly lit corridors.
He sits down on his office chair in front of his PC, types furiously for a few minutes, and fills a few forms.
As he is finished, he sends two emails from his personal account.
Just a little insurance.
Then he hurries back toward the dressing room, at this point in time, there aren’t that many employees present.
They have gone home or are doing some free time activities in other parts of the facility.
He enters the dressing room and hastily ditches the suit for his preferred wear as well as putting the camera back on the shelf.
Frank makes a swift exit from the facility, he hadn't exactly done anything wrong, but he couldn't help but feel uneasy.
The facility no longer felt like his place, no longer like a home—a foreign dark corner of the world with shady personnel and even shadier business.
He breaks through the heavy door with a struggle and enters the yard.
The sun has almost set already.
Damn, it's that late already?
I hope Amethyst is doing alright...
