William Lee Beauchamp whisked his desk chair into the center of the cordoned test zone of his team’s lab, hundreds of feet below the rocky ground of Cheyenne Mountain State Park in Colorado Springs. He wheeled a monitoring device behind him to which he was attached via five sticker tipped cords. He checked his surroundings before plopping down upon the chair and positioning the machine next to him. It beeped softly in time with his heart.
He slapped his hands on his thighs. “Let’s do this.”
One of his colleagues, a cardiologist named Baxter Walcott, pleaded with him. He held up one ink stained hand as if to ward off evil and rubbed his eyes under wire framed glasses as he spoke.
“Bill, please. We have no idea what will happen here. It’s late. We’re tired.”
“Nonsense! How many times do we have to run around in circles here? I’m in my prime, Baxter. I’ll be fine. Shoot.”
“Absolutely not,” Baxter said, turning away.
“Fine. Wuss. Sarah, you do it.”
Sarah Foss was rolling what looked to be a standard bullet up and down her forefinger with her thumb. She popped it into the middle of her palm and held it up to her eye, as if checking its lines.
“I don’t know, Bill. Just because the mice recovered doesn’t mean…”
