WS of the inside of CLARK’s lab, focused on the large double door to the outside. The sounds of a hose being turned off can be heard, and a moment later, CLARK pushes the heavy metal doors open. Walking behind him as he enters is a slowly plodding white Shorthorn cow, BERYL. BERYL’s tongue is hanging from her mouth, and appears visibly red and swollen. Copious drool trails from her mouth as CLARK leads her over to the sizable livestock operating theater in the center of the room. Her hooves leave wet, but clean, footprints on the linoleum floor - apparently, they were rinsed thoroughly before she came inside.
CLARK
I’m sorry again about this, Beryl. I should have caught this a
while ago, but between the missions, the repairs to the house, and
trips out to the mountains, I’ve not been looking after you all as
closely as I should.
BERYL
*pant, pant*
CLARK
I know it hurts, girl. We can fix it, I promise. Come on over here
and have a lie down.
CLARK gently coaxes BERYL into a laying position in the operating theater before pulling on a pair of gloves and donning a surgical mask. He takes a syringe from his bag and rummages through one of the supply cabinets for a few moments before coming out with a clear bottle of anesthetic. He performs some quick calculations based on BERYL’s body mass and then fills the syringe, chatting all the while.
CLARK
Wooden tongue’s a lot easier to treat early on, but you must have
gotten worse over the long weekend. We’re gonna have to drain
the swelling and put you on antimicrobial irrigation. Guess you must
be wondering what I’ve been up to that’s more important than looking
after you, huh?
BERYL
Mooooooo.
CLARK
Well, I feel like I owe you at least a little explanation. Me, Simon,
and the ComGuard have been busy as bees these last few months.
You’ll never guess what our latest big escapade was! Go on, guess.
BERYL merely regards CLARK with a patient but pained expression. He sighs.
CLARK
Sorry. Let’s get you squared away.
CLARK approaches BERYL and coaxes her into opening her mouth a bit more, revealing that her tongue is grotesquely swollen, red, and quite rigid. He probes for a bit, to much grunting and consternation from BERYL, before choosing a place to inject the local anesthetic. Only CLARK’s tight but comforting grip on the back of her head and his soothing manner with animals prevent the cow from thrashing as her tender tongue suffers the injection.
CLARK
There, there, girl. You’re gonna be just fine soon, don’t you worry.
Now, where was I? Right, Operation Mechsteal. Our fellow Resistance
fighters don’t get points for creative codenaming, but the information they
gave us was good enough. We were able to find a mech hangar out in
the middle of the woods near Devil’s Tower, and there were just four Wobbie
guards playing poker.
BERYL seems to relax as the anesthetic numbs her aching tongue.
CLARK
Yeah, I was relieved too. I gotta say, I had no idea what we’d be
getting into. Alex formed a plan, and we all went in, sneaking
across the clearing and using the sides of their prefab hangar to
hide us from view till we were practically on top of them. Shin
and David went in first, David in his crazy shrubbery outfit. I guess
they saw him, ‘cause I heard one of the Wobbies say to his
buddies, “We’re allowed to shoot bushes, right?”
BERYL
Mooooo!
CLARK
I know! The nerve of those assholes, pardon my French, joking
about being about to kill a man. Well, David got behind cover
before they opened up, and Shin sure let them have it. That was
Alex’s and my signal to come at them from behind as they were turning
to face David and Shin. It was tense, but nothing I couldn’t handle.
There is a distinct pause as CLARK, who was sterilizing his tools, stares off into space.
CLARK
It hardly bothered me at all, this time. The Word of Blake has
done so many terrible things. They’re still people, of course, but...
things are different, now. We’re at war, and I think I see what that
means.
CLARK takes his scalpel and a suction tube attached to a small, rolling bucket over to where BERYL is laying peacefully. He slips the suction tube into her mouth and powers up the vacuum. Slurping sounds can be heard as the tube clears the cow’s mouth of drool, and BERYL barely flinches as CLARK begins making incisions to drain her swollen tongue of pus and fluid.
CLARK
In a way, it’s not so different from medicine. If something goes
rotten, sometimes, you just have to cut it out. If there’s complications
in a birth, you sometimes have to lose the calf to save the mother. It’s
hard, but I’d gotten used to it. Someone has to make those kinds of calls.
That someone might as well be me. Dangerous hubris? Perhaps. But
I know right from wrong, dammit, and what the Word is doing is wrong.
BERYL
*Grunt*
CLARK calms himself, shoulders slumping a bit as he releases tension he didn’t realize he’d been holding.
CLARK
Thanks for understanding. It’s good to get that off my
chest. Anyway, Alex got in the ‘Mech while I took care
of the bodies and Simon took care of the hangar’s cameras and
communications feed. I guess it needed some sort of code thing,
because Cho had to go up and install it before Alex could move the
thing. I guess its neural sensors were off, too, because Alex
practically tripped his first step out of the hangar!
As he makes the last cut, CLARK tosses the gore-soaked scalpel into a shallow metal tray. He gets up and fetches a large bottle of iodine solution, then settles back down to begin hooking up an irrigation system that will keep BERYL’s mouth constantly disinfected.
CLARK
We split off into the forest after that, with David flying his chopper
and Alex forced to run over land. The Word showed up pretty quickly,
of course, but Alex managed to keep one step ahead them for a while.
Considering how misaligned the neural uplink sounded like it was, he
must really be a hell of a pilot.
CLARK gently tilts BERYL’s head so that she doesn’t swallow any of the iodine solution, and then begins to rinse her freely flowing wounds. The suction tube’s slurping increases in volume and intensity.
CLARK
Speaking of pilots, it’s a good thing David knows what he’s doing in that
chopper. They almost caught Alex at one point, but he buzzed them so
close that I could practically see the stunned Wobbie pilots sitting in their
‘Mechs as we passed! It gave Alex the distraction he needed to get away
again. But he might never have outdistanced them if Simon hadn’t come
up with his bright idea. Simon spoofed the ‘Mech’s tracking signature to
Cho’s chopper while Alex powered down to hide and rip out the transponder.
By the time the Word realized they were chasing a wild goose, we were
both long gone! Ha!
CLARK allows the rinse to continue as he seems to collect his final thoughts.
CLARK
We stashed the ‘Mech in a chasm with a cave at the bottom I know about
from some mycological excursions, and hid it as best we could. We still
need to take trips out there once a month to do maintenance on the thing, though.
I guess building a new silo for it would probably be worthwhile in terms of
help to the Resistance - i.e., us. Sorry we were gone so long this time, girl.
I promise I won’t let anything like this happen to you again.
BERYL nuzzles CLARK’s shoulder, her mouth hanging open and fluids flowing freely. Fade to black.
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