Brink's Machine

         Carl was uneasy. Brink would not have called him in the middle of the night if something important hadn’t happened. For months he had been poring over old anatomy and microphysics texts, making careful notes, conducting mysterious experiments, and sending Carl on countless errands to libraries, scientific research centers, NASA, MIT, and the local hardware store. The last such errand had been to Stop n’ Shop to pick up a fruit basket, which Carl had assumed was a ploy for funding disguised as an early Christmas gift to their Board of Directors. Brink no longer kept him updated on the progress of his project other than occasional words of motivation, more self-directed than anything else. “We’re on the edge of a breakthrough, Carl, in six months we’ll have changed the world as we know it.” Carl was, after all, merely the scientist’s assistant. He was not the one who would be ruined if the Department of Biological Reanimation Theory did not begin making results soon. All Carl had to do was go on equipment and coffee runs and make sure the test tubes didn’t boil over.
         Tonight was different. It had been a particularly busy day, and he was finally on his way up to bed when his wife sleepily handed him the phone, telling him that Brink wanted him back at the lab ASAP with another fruit basket, and adding snarkily that if he wasn’t going to keep her company at night anymore could he at least bring home some vodka as a substitute. As he drove around the darkened city, looking for a place that would be selling fruit baskets and hard liquor at 12:21 AM, he began to wonder if Brink had indeed made his breakthrough.
         When he entered the lab, half an hour later, Brink swooped down on him and relieved him of the basket. Dr. Raymond Brink was a fairly handsome man in his late forties, or perhaps he would have been handsome if he had slept in the past three days. Some of his colleagues joked that he was “married to his career”. Carl, who knew Brink better than anyone having worked with him for the past eight years, would not have been shocked to receive a wedding invitation.
         “Thanks, Carl. Not too expensive, I hope. Wait’ll you see what I’ve done.” He led the assistant into the other room, barely able to restrain a childlike glee. “Take a look at my baby, Carl,” he said with a magnificent gesture.
         Carl stared. He had only seen pieces of the machine, a few rough sketches of visions from a brilliant mind. After years of hard research and failed experiments, it appeared to finally be finished, and Carl wondered why it didn’t look more impressive. It stood about four feet tall, a grayish steel box with two Plexiglas tanks attached to the front. A tangle of wires spilled out the back like disgorged intestines.
         “Is it done?”
         “I hope so. All set for testing, anyway.” He put the fruit basket in one tank and a bowl of water in the other. Near the top of the bowl an expired goldfish floated limply. He latched the door, leaped nimbly back up to where Carl was standing and powered up a nearby computer. “Ready to try it out?”
         “Are you sure this is a good idea?” Carl was suddenly worried. “We should do more research before we test this thing. It could be dangero—”
         “There’s no time for more research,” replied Brink seriously. “Anyway, the machine will work. It has to, or else we’re both out of a job. Do you think after eight years in a department with a name like Biological Reanimation Theory –twelve years in my case-- that they’ll hire us anywhere else? It’s now or never, Carl; if we don’t get the results we’ll never get the funding. That’s why we’ve been forced to work in the laboratory equivalent of my garage for the past three years. But not anymore,” he said, pushing a pile of papers aside to reveal a large, important-looking red switch. “This time, we’ve done everything right.”
         He flipped the switch and strange things began to happen. The machine started to buzz quietly. The fruit in the basket began to blacken and shrivel.
         “What it does,” Brink narrated quietly to Carl as they observed the process, “is suck the life-force out of the fruit in the first tank, and hopefully—hopefully—transfer it to the goldfish. It’s not a very efficient process, unfortunately, nearly two thirds of the life energy is lost. That’s why an entire basket of fruit is needed to reanimate something even so simple as a goldfish… it’s working! Carl!” He pointed to the second tank. The fish was twitching. Slowly, it turned itself upright and began to swim in a disoriented loop around its bowl.
         “Amazing,” breathed Carl. “Congratulations, Brink, you’ve done the impossible.”
         “Well, this is only the first step, Carl!” his superior said, extracting the goldfish bowl and setting it on a table to admire it. “There’s no limit to what we could do with this technology… There’s another experiment I’d like to do tonight, actually. I’ll need you to go out again.”
         “Of course!” cried Carl, the enormity of the little fish’s confused movements beginning to sink into his brain. “Where do you need me to go?”
         “To the morgue, actually.” Brink pulled a roll of bills from his wallet. “Here are two hundred dollars and a note from me to give to the night watchman. He’s an old friend of mine, he won’t give you any trouble.”
         Carl was shocked into silence. “What?” he asked after a few seconds’ time. Brink repeated himself. He seemed perfectly serious.
         “You want me to get… a… a dead…?”
         “Yes Carl, that’s what I said. Nothing too large. An infant will suffice, maybe an eight month old. I’ve written it all down on the note, you shouldn’t have any trouble.”
         “…A baby?” the assistant asked weakly, not quite believing that he was actually having this conversation.
         “I think I’ve made myself perfectly clear—”
         “No.” Carl felt sick. “Are you insane? No. That’s not… ethical, is it?”
         “How isn’t it ethical? If all goes well, we’ll be bringing it back to life, a life that it would otherwise have missed entirely.”
         “I won’t do it.”
         “You will, though,” said Brink quietly. “Or I’ll do it myself. And I’ll make sure you never find work in the scientific community again. Your wife won’t be very pleased when she hears that your future has gone down the drain, and that you’ll both be working at Stop n’ Shop for the rest of your lives. You’ve been planning to have a family of your own soon, haven’t you? Pray tell, how will you feed them? How will you look into your children’s eyes and tell them they can’t have everything their precious little hearts desire, because you didn’t think it ethical to—”
         “All right!” cried Carl, putting on his coat. “All right, I’ll… I’ll go.”
         Thus Carl found himself standing outside of the city morgue, talking to the night watchman. The transaction was disturbingly easy. The man disappeared for a few minutes, and returned with a plastic wrapped bundle, like a stork from some horror movie.
         “Congratulations, it’s a girl,” he growled seedily, and gave a barking laugh. Carl took the bag, trying desperately not to think about what he was doing, and scurried back to his car. He placed the bundle in the trunk, wiped his hands in disgust on his coat, and drove away. The highway was dark and empty. He glanced down at his trembling fingers and gripped the steering wheel tighter in an effort to stop them. He thought about the vodka he’d bought for his wife, and decided that he needed it more. Taking the next turn rather sharply, he thought he heard the bag slide across the trunk and bump into the opposite wall. Shuddering, he turned up the radio as loud as he could to help drown out his thoughts. By some freak coincidence, he had been listening to his Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein audio book that morning on the way to work. As he scrambled to eject the offending tape, a wave of dead baby jokes sprang unbidden into his mind. The car swerved to the curb. Carl tumbled out and vomited into the roadside ditch.
         The sun was just beginning to turn the sky grey when Carl finally made it back to the lab. As he entered, a loud screeching noise greeted him, followed by the sight of Brink attempting to stuff a large bag of angry seagulls into the first Plexiglas tank.
         “Where did those come from?” he asked with surprise.
         “I trapped them up on the roof yesterday,” the scientist replied. “Did you get the specimen?”
         “You mean the baby?”
         “Yes. Thank you very much Carl. I’m sorry I snapped at you. I know you’re not used to this sort of science.” He latched the door of the bird prison and brushed grimy feathers from his lab coat. “Researchers have been enlisting the service of morgues illegally for hundreds of years, even since the time of Leonardo DaVinci. All in the name of scientific truth.” He took the bag from Carl and inspected it. “This will do wonderfully. Thank you.” He cut open the plastic. Carl turned away nauseously.
         “I’d rather not watch, Brink,” he muttered.
         “Suit yourself.” Carl heard the machine buzzing again. The crying of the seagulls was suddenly cut short. A few seconds later, there was a tiny scream.
         “Carl!” cried Brink. “Come look! It’s beautiful!”
         Curious despite himself, Carl turned. Brink lifted the baby into his arms and wrapped her carefully in a spare lab coat. She was alive, and screaming at the top of her little lungs.
         “We’ve done it,” said Brink with tears in his eyes. “She’s alive.” He handed the bawling infant to Carl, who took her gently and peered into her big, surprisingly blue eyes. It was remarkable, if nothing else. He glanced at his superior. “What now?”
         “Well, we’ll have to run more tests, of course,” said Brink, flitting about happily among piles of notes. “The girl will have to be kept here. I’ll inform the cleaning service, I’m sure they can be paid not to touch her or tell anyone she’s here. She can stay in the supply closet. We’ll have to observe her while she develops. I still have no idea whether she retained her own human mind, or if she now possesses the mentality of a flock of seagulls. That’s one of the things we’ll have to watch for, maybe do an experiment to see whether she’s more attracted to a bottle of milk or a dumpster… it’s unfortunate that we’ll only have a few years to work with her before she becomes too large to manage… but we have the machine, and the morgue is always full of prospective subjects. As for this one… well, we’ll think of some way to dispose of her. Or perhaps,” he said with a laugh, “she can be your assistant, Carl!” He laughed again, aglow with excitement as he saw his years of struggle and failure finally coming to an end. “Yes, why not? We could make you a whole army of—”
         With a thud, the metal pipe descended on Brink’s head. He yelped in surprise. The second time Carl hit him, he fell to the floor, unconscious. Dropping the pipe, Carl grabbed the scientist’s arms and dragged him out of the lab, through the empty corridors and carried him ungainly down the concrete steps into the parking lot. Running back inside, he emerged again with the child, and nestled her on the front seat of his car. Glancing about to make sure no one else was there, he entered the empty building for the last time. When he returned, smoke was already beginning to pour from the windows. He lifted one of his fallen superior’s legs and dragged him further away from the burning building.
         “Well, Mr. Brink,” said Carl, imitating the voice of the Director of the Board. “It appears that the only evidence as to the cause of the fire is the gasoline can that you had in your possession when we found you.” He laid the mostly empty gas can next to Brink and removed the bottle of vodka from his pocket. “And as it appears that you were drinking at the time of the incident…” He poured some down the exanimate man’s throat, took a long swig himself, and splashed the rest on Dr. Brink’s face and clothes. Brink began to stir. Hurriedly, Carl kicked him. He stopped moving. “…and your assistant, Carl Parkinson, was asleep at his home, according to his wife…we have no choice but to consider you responsible for the fire. As for your story about the child… well, let’s just say we find the possibility of biological reanimation to be hopelessly remote.” The coming dawn and the blazing building behind him illuminated the path back to his car. “In light of this past incident, and the recent lack of progress in your department, the Board of Directors is politely but firmly requesting your early retirement.” He opened his door and paused to look back on the man lying unmoving on the pavement. “Sorry, old friend,” he muttered, and slid into his seat.
         The little girl had stopped crying and was watching him with her blue eyes. He picked her up and set her on his lap. “Now what am I going to do with you?” he inquired of the infant as he started the car and sped away from the destruction he had wrought behind him. What a strange night it had been. “You need a real home,” he whispered to her. “No experiments or tests, just a place to grow up and be loved.” His tiny companion gurgled. Carl smiled faintly, and wondered what his wife would say if he brought her home a daughter.