HALE PROTOCOL
ENTRY 21: TURNED
DECEMBER 1, 1930
A scar where the car had hit him.
What an awful excuse. And, quite honestly, as Roger sat by in that damned spinning chair, he thought that he might of come up with a better one. He sighed as he spun around and around and around and thought. He thought of things he regretted. They were numerous.
"Dr. Williams!" A voice barked, "What in God's name are you doing? Has all that time down in that filthy laboratory of yours driven you batty?"
"It's actually not that dirty!" Wilhelm chuckled. All this time, and he was still a dunce. He'd been here just as long as Roger had. He should've learned by now.
The whole room though, undoubtedly, was a flurry of excitement. A whole meeting had been called up in the age-old presentation room Roger knew so well. Except, this time he was sitting at the head of the table opposite to Mr. Griffiths'. His superior looked rather cross, as always. Roger had been trying to push down his hatred for the man. It seemed to be working so far, at least in public. Still, Roger couldn't stop spinning. It was addictive and unintentional, a sad consequence of such a silly chair design. Or maybe…it was probably just nervous energy.
"If you didn't want me to spin," Roger stated, "Then you shouldn't have put the damned thing up here in the first place."
"The problem has never occurred before." A gruff man in a too-tight suit commented. Roger didn't like his looks, even if he couldn't fully see him from the whirling images that assaulted his eyes from the seat. He chuckled once, made one last revolution, then stopped the movement abruptly with his foot.
"Well, now we know, don't we?" He shot through a half-smile.
"That's quite enough, Dr. Williams." Mr. Griffiths intervened, "Let's get down to business here. Unlike you, we haven't got all day."
"I never said I had all day." Roger scoffed, crossing his arms over his white coat and sinking farther into the plush chair. "Geez, what do you think I do? I have things to attend to today, so yes, I'd like to get started."
"Go ahead, no one's stopping you." A shiny bald man urged. Roger smiled and mentally shuffled his papers.
"Yes, fine." Roger started, "First off, I need to talk to you, Mr. Griffiths, about your new assistant, Wilhelm." He shot the chairman a dubious look from behind his ever-growing black hair.
"What about him?" Mr. Griffiths sighed, glancing at Wilhelm, who only laughed nervously.
"Yeah, could you stop letting him down into the lab," Roger droned, "He keeps breaking all our shit."
"I don't break any shit!" Wilhelm blurted out.
"You do." Santha sighed from where she stood behind Roger's chair. She had been originally thrilled to come for the conference, but now just sounded exasperated. She also sounded slightly embarrassed of her…boss.
"He breaks shit." Roger agreed, "We need that to further our studies."
"Could you stop with the vulgar language?" The tight-suit man insisted.
"Indeed." Mr. Griffiths stated, "But, I'll get that handled right away, Dr. Williams. Now, I can trust that that's not the only reason you called this meeting."
"Yes, you've never called one before." The bald man huffed.
Roger thought for a moment. That's right, there was that. The real reason he had come here, in front of all the people who had previously ridiculed him. Sighing, he pulled the manila folder out of his lab coat and slid it into the middle of the maple-wood table. It spun to a stop, just like his chair.
"What's that?" Another man asked. He wore thick glasses that fell too loose on his face.
"That would be the synopsis on the young boy designated as my first subject." Roger threw his feet up onto the table top, sighing tiredly and allowing the distrust and anger to leak into his gaze. His voice, however, remained flat. He was still in control. "I've updated it with blood work, and everything I've managed to compile about him…of course, those records are only copies. Naturally, I'd keep the originals to myself."
"Naturally…" Mr. Griffiths smiled. It was a poisonous smile.
"Naturally." Roger agreed, shooting him an equally cruel smile.
The man with the dangerously tight suit reached up from his chair and flipped through the folder, glancing over each document carefully. Nobody else moved, but Roger could tell by their eyes that they were curious.
"What's this?" The man asked angrily.
"Those are medical records." Roger stated again.
"What does it mean?" The glasses man restated.
"Well, I've done many tests…all before the surgery, rest assured…and I've come to the conclusion that this Simon…what's his last name…"
"Understood." Mr. Griffiths growled, "Go on, Dr. Williams."
Roger laughed without humor and continued. He knew, naturally, that Hale's father would have to listen with what he brought to the table; both literally and figuratively.
"I wish to have complete custody of the boy." Roger demanded fire in his eyes as he glanced up, "As you can see plainly by the tests I've run…The boy is mine."
"What do you mean?"
"He's my son." Roger finally said. Santha let out a little gasp. He'd forgotten that he hadn't told her yet.
"If I'm allowed to ask," The glasses-man brought up, "who's the mother?"
"I'm afraid that's confiscated information…" Roger sighed, "Unless…Mr. Griffiths would deny me custody, then I'd be willing to give you the full story. Every. Last. Detail."
"This is borderline blackmail, Dr. Williams." Mr. Griffiths fumed, speaking in a furious whisper.
"And what you did to me wasn't?" Roger shot back, "For your information, I'm just trying to protect my family. I'm sure that under my circumstances, any of the men at this table would do the same…or women. My apologies, Santha."
"No problem, sir." Santha dismissed.
"Get out of my sight." The chairman looked away and growled angrily, "You can keep the boy, just make sure you keep up on all your objectives. And don't let this get to your head, Dr. Williams."
"Of course not." Roger stood up, collected his papers, and motioned for Santha to follow him on his way out. He smiled devilishly at the assistant as he walked out the door. "Wilhelm." He piped, a quick goodbye.
"D-Dr. Williams, see you around." He said back.
"I'm thinking not." Roger continued his power-strut out of the main lobby of the building, across to the metal door at the end of the hall that marked the lab; the big yellow sign that said NO ACCESS PERMITTED in bold black letters. Santha's heels clicked behind him. Deep in his chest, some freeing feeling was released. He sighed in relief, letting go of at least one worry. Simon was safe. Part of him could lay at rest now. The fire in his eyes died out, and was replaced with his usual lucid brown glow. He propped up against the door, trying to open it with his foot. Santha sighed and blocked the way determinedly. Roger stood back, confused.
"I just want to say, sir, with all due respect," she muttered, "that what you did back there to the chairman was really stupid."
"…"
She looked up and smiled half-heartedly all of a sudden. It caught Roger off-guard. "But you're stronger than I thought you were. Especially for someone so young…I don't know what you've been through, and I'm not going to ask…" She opened the door slowly and let him in, "However, I have a lot more faith in you now. I'd never be able to do what you just did."
"Th-thanks, Santha!" Roger laughed breathily, starting to descend down the stairs to the lab. Already, the walls were turning white again, "It really wasn't anything all that special…"
"Whatever." Santha was back to her normal self again as she briskly passed him on her way down to work, "Let's go check Simon's readings. If the calculations are correct, he should be up by a little past midnight tonight."
Roger stood up a little straighter as they continued down the path. "Yeah, I sure hope so."
Santha shot him a look. "You nervous?"
"H-huh?"
"People can read you like a book when you're like this." She scoffed, "…by the way, should I assume what you said in the conference room was confidential?"
This, again, took Roger off-guard. "You would do that for me?"
"So, it is." Santha nodded and pushed open the door at the bottom of the stairs. She inserted her key-pass into a little slot by a metal detector quickly and kept walking forward. "I won't tell. What's yours is yours."
"Thanks."
"No problem, boss."
…
Wagh! Long chapter again!
I hope you liked this chapter. I don't really have anything to say…so…yeah…
THANKS TO ALL YOU READERS. Special shout out to JUST ANOTHER BELEIVER for reviewing. THANKSTHANKSTHANKYOU! You guys have no idea how much I love writing for you. I love this story too. I can't wait until everything comes together, and I hope you share my enthusiasm! Please share your feels in the reviews! I WANT TO KNOW YOU FEELS! XD
Sorry for being weird…
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ALSO: disclaimers…I'm not named after the chef. I'm not a lesbian. No, the chef is not my mother. If you don't know what I'm talking about, sorry. It's just that I've been getting some weird questions from friends recently about being named after Cat Cora, who's apparently a lesbian chef? Correct me if I'm wrong here, guys. I don't watch cooking shows…but, be assured, I AM NOT A CHEF, NOR AM I LESBIAN. XD. I have nothing against lesbians, I am just not one myself. SORRY FOR ANY CONFUSION
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