Sini's short story #01 : The Hummingbird Shoes

A/N pre story: I started this one about a week ago, wrote it on three days (not 'in' because there were days in between typing). It all started with one image - or perhaps a still frame - my mind conjured one evening. Take a wild guess what that was, I think it's pretty obvious. I need to work on my subtlety... Oh, and if anyone knows how to make "livejournal cuts" in blogger, that is hide most of the text behind one click, I'd greatly appreciate it if you taught me how to do it.

Now, onto the story.


The Hummingbird Shoes
- by SiniSketch -

The sharp click of heels ping-ponged from the soulless monochrome walls of the long, claustrophobic corridor. The sound preceded her, a helpless herald to a steadily approaching doom.

In fairy tales, the cold halogen lights illuminating the way would surely have dimmed at her passing, shadowed her unchanging, statue expression from non-existent observers.

However, this was no flimsy story of one-dimensional villainy. The only shroud covering her was of her own making, concealing the equations churning in her razor mind. No one in the facility of corridors, the beehive of researchers, had ever cared to try to breach her skin.

Her metronome steps took her soon to the door at the very end of the corridor. At the sweep of a clearance card the reinforced metal doors slid open, exposing the den of data to her disinterested gaze.

One high-heeled shoe caught the glare of the halogen lights in the brief moment she passed through the door. The carcass of a hummingbird flared emerald, a fresh kill, still glorious.

The laboratory door closed with false finality behind her. A clipboard held loosely at the crook of her arm was flipped to a writing position in one efficient move as she set out to inspect the incubators. The quiet scratch of her mechanical pen was the only sound to mingle with the clacking of heels against standardised flooring.

The bacteria were growing well, she noted and scribbled down her observations. All Petri dishes were carefully studied but with no more attention nor interest than necessary. The common, harmless bacteria cultivated, manipulated and stored here lacked potential.

Having completed the menial task, she briskly signed the report and placed it in a wall rack that existed for this function only.

She glanced finally at the other door in the far end of the laboratory. For the first time in the span of weeks her carefully rouged lips curved into a real smile. In a fairy tale, the evil witch would have smirked, perhaps cackled crow-like. Here, the smile was genuinely happy, a more terrible thing to fathom than any open cruelty.

She approached this door with slow, savouring steps. Years and years of her life had been spent to gain access to the rooms behind it. Her coffee hair was now streaked with grey, her soft features sharpened with age. Yet the most changes had occurred in the intangible depths of her mind, cause and effect chocking her in their strangling embrace.

Hatred had blossomed.

The emotion carried her feet to the door, spurred her as she wielded once more her toiled-for clearance card. The heavy metallic slab hissed slowly aside.

The room was small. Six suits were lined on the wall, marked with a symbol society feared more than nuclear weapons. An array of strong and a few lethally toxic chemicals were stored in the locked cupboards on either side of the metal door. There was a plain industry line sink hugging the wall opposite her. Two benches crouched near the side walls, weary sentries stooping from ages of servitude.

She pursed her lips. This was no time to dawdle.

One last barricade remained. Two imposing, vault-like doors fixed in an airlock sequence, operable only from this room, guarded the common beast turned predator. Beyond the doors lay history reborn, time machine so carelessly restrained.

Muscles straining, she struggled open the first door, breaking a nail while operating the mechanics. Taking a deep breath without realising it, she stepped into the space between the doors and closed the first one, hand shaking from a mercurial concoction of excitement and fear. Fear of failure tore at her intestines. She grasped the controls of the second door with a sweaty grip. The locks shifted with startling clangs, lending their voices to the drama.

The stark box of a laboratory revealed at last was a study of seals and layers of see-through materials. The containment space stood altar-like in the very centre of the room, punctured by four pairs of long, unnerving black gloves.

She reached into the pocket of her white coat and brought out a colourless cutter worth five months' pay. With a grim look on her face, she slashed repeatedly at one glove, which endured the relentless assault for almost ten seconds before puncturing and finally tearing. She swallowed and pushed her hand through the gap, fingers curling around a culture she had been working to perfect.

The countless hours had finally paid off. She held in her hand a highly resistant and extremely virulent variant of Yersinia pestis.

Heels flashing gleaming green, she hurried back through the double doors and very nearly threw herself on a bench. Sitting there, she was condemned with a wrench of a lid.

Paranoia had kept cameras out of this room and the small laboratory. Mistrust of the security personnel was deeply ingrained, and the scientists guarded their treasure trove with dragon-like zeal. Their secrecy had aided her plans immensely.

She reached to the underside of the bench, well-manicured nails working under strips of tape lurking in the shadow. A rectangular tube greeted the white light of the halogens. Her deft fingers flew over a set of keys on one side, opening a receptacle space at one end of the tube. The opened Petri dish was pushed inside and fixed in the device with a tap of a key. She bit her lip. This was it. The last phase had begun.

After a complex sequence of keystrokes, the device came to life. Humming. The screech of a diamond against a window pane. Clack! Hiss. Over and over again the sounds leapt from the tube. She felt cold sweat on her brow.

Silence.

The hummingbird shoes carried her to the sink. The two rooms had a separate ventilation system from the rest of the facility but the water...

She turned on the cold water tap.

Manipulating the other end of the now tranquil tube open, she watched with watering eyes as what appeared to her human sight as grains poured down to mingle with the colourless liquid. For the briefest moments they danced, water and tiny capsules. Then the drain slurped them down.

She stared after them and after litres of water that followed. Finally, a shudder brought her to her knees like a worshipper in front of their deity.

It was now out of her hands. She did not know if the capsules would survive the sewers long enough to find their way to the rats. The messengers. She could not predict how, if at all, her little gift to humanity would find its way to the recipients. So many possible outcomes. One certain.

The tube gave a meek click as it released the Petri dish. The gaze that met the cultivated surface was shuttered. This was the last confession.

A single, slow lick.


A/N post story: I have to say here that I wondered if I should post this story today, after what has happened here in Finland. I came to the conclusion that my bit of fiction is dissimilar enough to the school shooting that it shouldn't aggravate anyone too much, which is why I posted it as planned.

As to the short story itself, the focus was on illustrating what this person does. Everything else, her reasons and identity, location, date, backstory, was left out. I wanted readers to fill out the blanks themselves, ponder a bit. Do you think she's a monster? A misanthrophist? Plain old nutter? I know what I think, but that is not in any way the "truth".

The open ending is one of the things I've become to appreciate over the years. It leaves room for a multitude of interpretations, which for a person like me who hates overly masticated endings is really the only way to go.

Well, thassit, thanks for reading. Until next time.