₴₮Ɽ₳₦₲ɆⱤ ₮Ⱨ₳₦ ₣ł₵₮łØ₦ | 6 | The Calm Before
The events at the lab have left Gracie shaken. She's strayed too far from her roots, forgotten the commitment she made all those years ago as a rookie reporter to journalistic integrity. As a result, someone she loves landed in the line of danger and the severity of the unexplained phenomenon devastating Strangerville has worsened. She must return to lawful, safe, and unbiased forms of investigation.
To start with, she'll interview the town's residents, who have gone largely ignored in their plan of action so far. Although the mayor, Ted Roswell, seems to have been afflicted and will likely be in no state to intelligibly answer her questions, his wife might have some insight into his current condition - not to mention the shady deals he's been accused of making with the military for years now. Gracie makes her way to their mansion in the hills, by far the largest, most extravagant home in all of Strangerville.
To her surprise, she's greeted by Mayor Roswell himself. Although his demeanor seems normal, she's immediately skeptical, considering the reports of his behavior around town.
"Mayor Roswell?" she enunciates slowly, her voice raised to an unnaturally high volume. "Can you hear me?"
"Of course I can hear you!" he responds, sounding undeniably human. "You must be that out-of-town journalist I hear has been poking her nose into places it doesn't belong."
Gracie laughs nervously. "I'm just worried about what's been going on around here - strange plants, unpredictable weather, the explosion at the lab, residents getting sick and even disappearing... I can't help but wonder if all those things are somehow connected."
The Mayor shrugs off her concern. "The environment around these parts has always been unique! It's what makes this town so special. As for the so-called 'explosion,' it was a minor disruption that's been blown entirely out of proportion. And, believe you me, I've got my top people trying to figure out this illness, which I must remind you is contained to a very small fraction of the population."
"But it's spreading... And these spores in the air, I think they're-"
"Pollen, entirely harmless!"
Gracie wishes she could tell him about what they've found at the lab without exposing how they got into the lab in the first place. "But you yourself have been infected! I've seen-"
"Anyone can see I'm the picture of health. I don't know where you've picked up this nonsense. Now, please, I must ask you to refrain from coming to my home uninvited again."
Having gotten nothing out of Mayor Roswell besides an even deeper suspicion he knows far more than he's letting on, she heads to a humble house on the opposite side of town, where another one of the infected, a recent military transfer named Jess Sigworth, lives with her husband and daughter.
Gracie is welcomed into the house by Jess' husband, Dylan. She broaches the subject of his wife's illness carefully. "I'm a journalist investigating the recent goings-on in Strangerville for a national publication. I'm sorry to hear about your wife's condition. But this story will be huge, I promise you, and your involvement can raise awareness of what's happening to her and hopefully get her the help she needs."
Like the Mayor, Dylan Sigworth immediately laughs off her concern. "My wife's condition? Jess, get over here! There's a lady at our door who thinks you're deathly ill!"
The sight of Jess startles Gracie. She is so much more beautiful than her contorted face and jerky movements allowed them to see. "I don't know who told you I was sick, but I really am feeling fine, ma'am," she says matter-of-factly.
Mayor Roswell had reason to deny his illness, but, as far as Gracie can tell, this woman does not. She's a low-ranking soldier with a family to provide for. Does she simply have no memory of being possessed, the way Gaby still can't seem to recall anything about her brief spell in the lab? Is her husband in denial, or has the infection somehow scrubbed his memory, too? There seem to be three options: Jess always appears normal at home, Dylan is also a victim, or Dylan is lying. But Gracie can't ascertain which of these is most likely.
She decides to change the subject. "Do you know what happened at the lab in the crater?" she asks.
"I never had the security clearance. Only the scientists and the highest-ranking officials were allowed inside. It was all top secret. But..." She hesitates.
"But what?"
"There was a study a while back. Voluntary, but we were highly encouraged to participate and the money was good, so I agreed. The scientists who conducted it were from the lab. It was so strange." She laughs. "They just fed us fruit."
Gracie's ears perk up. "Did you say fruit?"
"Yeah, they said they were studying the supplementation of a typical diet with one serving of super fruit a day - you know, açaí berries, pomegranates, that kind of stuff - and how it impacted our agility and alertness. It went on for two or three months and then just stopped. We never learned anything about the outcomes. Then the lab was shut down."
Surely the fruit Jess mentioned, at least some of it, was produced by the purple flowers. Did the scientists know how it would affect their subjects? But her mention of the lab being shut down also reminds Gracie of the supposed explosion there. An image of the downed plane in the middle of the desert flashes in her mind. Could it have been the explosion that grounded it? She wonders if the plane itself will reveal any clues.
She quickly realizes the plane is not just a plane. A crude wall has been fashioned into the side of it, fitted with a door that must lead to some kind of bunker. But it can't possibly be habitable down there, can it? She heaves the rusted door open and tentatively steps into the darkness behind it.
"Who's there?" a booming voice echoes, followed by a flurry of thunderous footsteps. Everything is suddenly illuminated by painfully bright artificial light. A grizzled man stands before her, in the unmistakable garb of a pilot.
"Good afternoon, sir," she begins uncertainly. "My name is Gracie Goth, and I'm a journalist investigating the strange occurrences in town. I was wondering if you could spare five minutes to answer some questions for me."
Without any warning, the man shoots his arm upward and slaps the side of her face, hard. He doesn't seem angry at her for intruding, just a strange mix of paranoid and bemused.
"What did you do that for?" she gasps, clutching her stinging cheek.
"Sorry, lady. I just had to make sure you weren't one of those weirdos spouting all that nonsense about blossoms and beauty and mothers. One can never be too safe around here. Now, who did you say you work for?"
Once he's convinced her humanity is intact, George Cahill proves remarkably chatty, though it soon becomes apparent he's spent too much time holed up in this bunker to have anything of real substance to chat about. Nearly a year ago, his beloved plane, Old Penelope, was passing over Strangerville when a sudden large flash of light in the sky caused the craft to short circuit and crash. The damage is irreversible, but he can't bear to leave her, so he turned her remains into a makeshift home, where he plans to stay until the day he dies. He rarely ventures out, having caught wind of the unexplained plague spreading throughout town shortly after he arrived.
"That flash of light you described... Do you think it could have been an explosion?"
George sits for a moment in thoughtful silence. "That's what they say, isn't it? Not that I have much experience with 'em, but it didn't seem like an explosion to me. Far as I can tell, it was just the light... like a bolt of fluorescent pink lightning. It seemed natural, not man-made. It would've almost been beautiful if it wasn't so terrifying."
Meanwhile, in town, Gaby doesn't even change before hitting the streets in search of answers on how to safely bypass the spore-infested lower levels of the lab. Although none of the scientists have been particularly forthcoming so far, their secrecy has seemed more fearful than malicious. She thinks she can get one of them to crack if she applies enough pressure.
"These questions you're asking," a red-headed scientist says, turning around and cocking her head in suspicion when Gaby approaches her. "You shouldn't have access to that information... unless you've been digging around in forbidden places."
Gaby stammers a response, thinking she's been caught red-handed. "Oh... I... uh... well..."
As Gaby's about to bolt, the scientist glances covertly in both directions then steps closer. Barely raising her voice above a whisper, she says, "I'm too terrified to go back, but somebody needs to get this mess under control. Before I left, I was working on analyzing spore clusters to craft a specialized filter, since they were penetrating even the highest-quality hazmat suits. If someone were theoretically able to collect enough spores to theoretically construct the infection profile data using one of the lab's chemical analyzers... then I could theoretically build a filter that would theoretically allow that person to safely navigate any contaminated area."
Suddenly, a military officer ambushes them from behind. "But that would require an infection scanner," he interjects, and Gaby wonders how much of their conversation he overheard, "and sadly that's patented military property."
The scientist scuttles off nervously, and the officer brushes Gaby's shoulder as he saunters in the opposite direction. As he passes, he leans so close to her ear she can feel his hot breath against her cheek. "I might be amenable to bargaining with a pretty girl like you, though." Then he's gone, leaving Gaby to ponder just how low she's willing to go for the information.
Back at the trailer, the fruit Daphne planted has blossomed with remarkable speed. She observes it by the hour, noting even the smallest of changes. She's no scientist, but something in the flower itself must be key to combating the infection, and she hopes her notes will prove useful in finding out exactly what that something is.
Ros is agitated and constantly on edge, and the vines clogging up the plumbing do nothing to improve her mood. She also isn't thrilled at the idea of Gaby giving some perverted military man free reign over her body to get what they need, but Gaby wakes up full of determination. She was able to get her hands on a couple of hazmat suits thanks to Erwin, but when she asked about an infection scanner, he told her that military-grade stuff was too risky for him to bother messing with. The officer is their only option.
"Listen, I'm not going to sleep with you," Gaby says as soon as she runs into him on the street.
He seems disappointed but unsurprised. "Fair enough."
"What else can I do to get my hands on that scanner?"
"Drop and give me one hundred."
"Seriously?"
"You heard me. On the ground, now."
It's a strange request, but Gaby happily obliges, since it's far less sinister than she was expecting. She's suddenly grateful for Ros' training, as exhausting as she found it at the time. Not that long ago, she would have struggled to do ten push-ups in a row, let alone one hundred.
"That was an impressive display of strength... for a girl," the officer sneers, and it's an effort for Gaby not to roll her eyes. "But I suppose it was good enough to earn you a prize."
With that, Gaby suddenly finds herself in possession of a scanner that should allow her to identify and collect the spore clusters necessary for crafting a filter. That is, if the scientist's theoretical offer still stands.
"I think I'm going to head back home for a while," Gracie announces when Gaby returns to the trailer. "I'm getting nowhere with these interviews, and I'm not in any hurry to sneak into that lab again. I do have a professional reputation to uphold, you know."
"Don't worry," Gaby says, eyes trained on the scanner. "We can handle things while you're gone."
Gaby has no idea how many spore clusters it will take to construct the infection profile data (or how one even goes about constructing infection profile data, but that's an obstacle to consider later), so everyone takes turns scanning...
...and scanning...
...and scanning until they can't possibly scan anymore.
"Alvin, hey!" Gaby exclaims upon bumping into one of the conspiracy theorists she met at the library. Almost instantly, she is wracked with guilt for bugging him. On the bright side, though, she now knows for certain he's just as in the dark about everything as she is (or was, considering how much she's discovered since that day).
He seems even tenser than before, his fists tightly balled at his sides. "There's something I've been meaning to tell you, and it isn't easy for me to say."
"Okay..."
"I haven't been able to stop thinking about you since we met. I've never felt this way about anyone before, but I think I really, really like you."
She can barely register her surprise before he pulls her in for a soft, tentative kiss. She hadn't come to Strangerville looking for love. In fact, the idea never even crossed her mind. But he seems so sweet. She knows she can't afford to be distracted now, but maybe, when all of this is over (because it has to end at some point, one way or another, doesn't it?)... The mere possibility sends a tingle up her spine.
"God, get a room, you two," Juniper deadpans. "Can't you see a girl's trying to work over here?"
Armed with several days' worth of collected spore clusters, Gaby, Juniper, and Ros head back to the lab. They avoid the contaminated hallway at all costs, but there's a room on the opposite side that appears to be clear. Hopefully, it contains a chemical analyzer; otherwise, they've hit another dead end.
"You guys keep watch for anything suspicious while I construct the infection profile data," Gaby says.
"Are you sure you know how to do that?" Ros asks.
"Not entirely, but I had an anonymous user on a message board walk me through it online... which means I'm the most qualified of any of us for the job."
In truth, Gaby is even less confident in her ability to succeed than she lets on. Science was one of her worst subjects in school, and there are at least two dozen buttons on the analyzer: one wrong move could spell disaster. But she takes a deep breath, pulls out her hastily scribbled notes, and takes her best shot.
By the time she's finished, the machine has spit out sequences of illegible data she can only hope contain the information the scientist requires buried somewhere within. Outside the doorway, Juniper and Ros, her supposed protectors, are nowhere to be seen.
"Come on," Ros exclaims. "It was so boring down there, not to mention creepy as hell. Besides, I think it's obvious by now that the military couldn't give two shits about keeping this place locked down."
"Did you get what you need?" Juniper asks.
"Let's hope so. We can't afford to lose any more time."