BETRAYAL: By McLean Swanson
Saturday, October 10th, 2009So this is how you repay me? After a solid thirty five years, two kids,
and even some grandchildren? After everything we’ve built up together, as a family, you do the worst possible thing to me, to us? How dare you, you insolent little wretch. You’ll get what’s coming to you, oh yeah, you definitely will.
A man in a white lab coat strolled up to two electronic doors, reached for his pocket and slid his identification through the card-reader; a green
light flashed and the doors slid open. He walked down a white sterile
hallway and slid his card through a second reader, and after another flash of green, stepped through the threshold and into an elevator. His eyes were bloodshot, his jaw was clenched, and his knuckles were white with fury, the smile stretched across his face almost looked maniacal.
The automatic doors closed behind him and the elevator began its descent underground.
You always loved it more than me, always. Over the years I had learned to cope with it, to settle for second best in your eyes. We even had
children, and they placed third behind me. I never thought you’d go this
far, that you’d cheat on your grandchildren, your children, or me, your
husband. I was there. I saw you two get into our bed and defile it. I felt
sick sleeping in it that same night, and hiding the fact that I knew only
compounded my nausea. You devil, you filthy backstabbing witch. You slept peacefully next to me, blissfully dreaming away. You have no idea how hard it was to keep my hands from wrapping themselves around your throat and squeezing tight.
Instead of killing you, I’m going to destroy you-you and the god damn thing you love the most: your company.
The elevator reached the bottom floor of ArcGen Laboratories, and opened to reveal a nondescript room with a single handsome man with slicked back hair sitting behind a desk next to two automatic doors. He looked up.
“Ah, good morning Al! How’re the grandkids?”
“Just fine,” Al managed. He made it to the doors and slipped his
identification card through the reader without losing his cool. He dropped
his card back into his lab coat’s breast pocket, and asked, “How’s Tess?”
The man behind the desk looked down and began to twist the ring on his
finger, “Oh, she’s all right… just the usual.”
“Good,” Al said, and stepped through the door.
You little prick. You’re going to pay for sleeping with my wife. You and
this god damn company are going straight to hell.
Al walked down a hallway, turned right, and made his way through an
intricate honeycomb of underground testing laboratories and offices. At
the rear of the structure his office door read, “Dr. Alfred Greene, Lead
Scientist and Researcher of ArcGen Industries.” He opened it and sat
himself down behind his computer.
I thought you loved me … I spent so many hours behind this desk, working for you, getting results and making your company successful. I even helped you hide the company’s illegal testing on humans from those shifty bastards in Congress. I did it all out of love, and I thought you loved me back…
But I guess times have changed.
Al reached under his desk and flicked a hidden switch. The cup holder
standing next to his keyboard disappeared to reveal a small glass
covering, and underneath it, a keyhole accompanied by a large red button.
Al opened a drawer on his left and removed his key from a manila folder.
I’m glad I had this safety precaution put in place just in case one of the
diseases was to escape from the laboratories. One broken Petri dish could
wipe an entire continent clean of human life.
He removed the glass case and put the key into the keyhole.
It is you who has done this, who has destroyed everything. Not me.
He turned the key. The red button began flashing, it was armed.
You have betrayed me, lied to me, and stabbed me in the back. And for
that, your beloved company, the prick you cheated on me with, and all of those years of hard work are going up in smoke.
The seams along his maniacal smile split and he began to shriek with
laughter.
I’ll see you in hell, bitch!
With mindless rage, Al slammed his fist against the flashing button.
****
A nuclear cloud was encroaching upon Los Angeles, where the home of Al and Sarah Greene lay in wait. Satellites had spotted a giant mushroom cloud just outside of LA earlier that day and every news station across the nation had gone into fear-fueled apocalypse-conspiracy frenzy. Many thought nuclear war had finally descended upon us and that the end times were near.
Sarah Greene knew what happened, though. She climbed to the roof of her two story townhouse, looked out into the blooming mushroom cloud, sighed, and dove for the pavement below.
©2009 McClean Swanson
McLean is a full time student at the University of California, Irvine
and is looking to put his English major to some good use. Having been
previously published, though under short fiction, he figured he’d try his
hand at scribing flash fiction.
