Flower

The green globs of goo wobble under a microscope inside a Petri dish with a masking tape tag that reads some long Latin name that only scientists use to determine the size of their vocabulary.

The green gel begins to snap and shake violently as a pink substance is introduced to the mixture. The green blob lashes out at the foreign thing like how an animal protects its territory. Without any mercy or pity, the green monster seems to leap around the pink mixture, consuming it like a hungry beast.

From the other end of the microscope there is an old man wearing a long white jacket. His head lacks hair, where the hair once was lay blotches of brown spots.

He peers in astonishment at the Petri dish from behind thick spectacles. A monitor to the left of the elderly man glows large digital pixels. The gladiatorial battle for domination under the microscope is blown up on a thirty-seven inch flat screen.

The room is dark with only the flicker of the monitor screen and its reflection off the stainless steel instruments and the refraction from beakers and bottles of various sizes.

There is a simple hum coming from the monitor and the eager heavy breathing of the mad scientist in the otherwise silent room. The clicks of the eyelet rotating as the professor tries to get a closer look at the raging battle under him breaks the quiet. Suddenly a distinctive knock is pounded on the door to the laboratory.

That stupid knock that everyone does, you know the knock, you probably use it. The scientist outside is a young intern out of grad school. She also wears a long white jacket which reaches to her mid thigh. She has it buttoned and it looks as though she would be wearing nothing underneath.

An attractive girl with black hair tied down to her skull and wrapped into a neat bun in the back of her head. She wears simple, but attractive, thin wire-frame glasses and her face is tight, smooth, and gently re-mastered with makeup.

Her name plate reads, "Sarah Johnson." Underneath her name is the division she currently works under, the Advanced Botany Research Department.

The old man grumbles and pulls his eyes away from the microscope and though she can't see through the mesh of glass and wire, he waves his wrinkled fingers, "Come in, Come in!" He yells as loud as a feeble old man could. There is a sense of excitement in his voice, like a child waiting for Christmas Eve to open presents.

Sarah walks in and closes the door behind her. With her figure, she should be a runway model, swaying her hips to and fro with that professional look with the chin raised, eyes staring into nothing. Instead, she hobbles quickly in her heels, not very balanced, why she wears them is beyond her.

"What is it doctor?" She smiles and raises her glasses to the bridge of her nose, peering at the battle on the screen. Her jaw drops as she looks at the Petri dish and the label on the side, "You've got to be kidding me!"

The old mad scientist nods frantically and smiles, his teeth are fake, but they do seem natural enough, they're far too healthy looking for a man his age.

"I've found it! I have finally found it!" He places his hand on her elbow, her hands propped on the table as she leans over slightly to look at the dish. Even though it is impossible to see what is happening at the microscopic level, she knows they have found the miracle cure. The cure for everything. The salvation for mankind. The fountain of youth.

"Do you know what you've done Doctor Barnes?" Sarah smiles gleefully with pearly whites, perfect and totally natural. She should be a model or pose for a Colgate advertisement.

"Forty years, I have waited for this!" He says quietly. He hasn't much strength left after his initial excitement. After all the adrenaline ran from his body, he feels it should be nap time.

"Forty years, Sarah. I can't believe we've done it."

She puts her fingers on the shiny brown stained head of the professor; her fingernails are coated in blood red nail polish. She should be a hand model for Maybelline, "That is amazing."

She lacks the words to express her excitement, her relief, and inside she begins to count the dollar signs. She would be an overnight success. She would be the richest female in the history of the world. She would be proclaimed the mistress of eternal life.

Both of the scientists grin at one another, "We're going to need to get more samples of the flower. We'll need to run more tests and verify this discovery. If you're right about this, Doctor Barnes, you have just found the cure for aging!" Sarah said to him as if she were speaking to a god.
Doctor Barnes spins around in his chair and picks up a telephone. He begins dialing a number and looks at his watch for the current time. It's late in California and everyone is asleep. It's three in the morning on the west coast.

"Doctor Ross, we've done it. We've found the subject!" Barnes said in another excited monologue, "The fountain! We've found it!"

Doctor Ross runs the advanced botany research department at Global Rev. A company designed to produce miracle cures for the FDA. Up until this discovery, the company was falling bankrupt after their last miracle drug that was passed under FDA regulations. The last drug caused blindness and it nearly cost the company everything from lawsuits.

Muffling is heard from the end of Doctor Barnes' earpiece. Sarah tries desperately to eavesdrop, but she fails miserably. She leans over, no effect, Doctor Ross just speaks too softly. She gives up and then turns around to watch the globs of color doing battle. By this time, the pink gel was infiltrated by green goo. Pink gel loses the battle and the entire Petri dish turns green under the microscope. The color of money.

While Doctor Barnes was turned around, busy and consumed in his discovery, he failed to pay attention to Sarah Johnson. That sly devil should be a model or an actress for a James Bond movie. She writes a text message to a rival company. She tells them she will steal the formula. She tells them she wants eighty percent of the profits gained from the medical miracle.

She looks over to the monitor and seems appears amazed again. Her day dreams of dollar signs bouncing around like a screen saver. The poor old man won't know what hit him. She decides that a simple injection of atropine followed by an anti-agent, produced at the lap, would do the trick perfectly. He would suffocate on his swollen tongue and the autopsy would reveal that he died of convulsions. A heart condition. No one would question it. No one would suspect foul play.

No one except for Doctor Ross.

Doctor Ross wouldn't be too skeptical. She knew of Doctor Barnes' medical conditions and that he could easily die from over excitement. The old tinker just wasn't as it used to be after his heart attack several years ago.

Yes, that's what she'll do. She'll sell the product and make millions.

She leans up and begins to turn around, "Doctor Barnes!" She said with a smile. Before she could say anymore, she could feel a sting in her lower back. Her veins fill with fire and sweat forms on her brow. He eyes quickly become wide, her body burns from the inside.

She stumbles down and grabs for anything to stop her fall. She grabs the Petri dish and the microscope. Both items come plummeting towards the ground. The Petri dish shatters as it hits the cold linoleum floor. The monitor instantly turns black as the wire connecting it to the microscope whips out.

"I'm sorry Sarah..." The old man says as he holds an empty syringe between his index and middle fingers. "I can't have you stealing my life long ambition..." The old man wasn't as stupid as she thought.

She looks up at him with curious and pleading eyes. The color of her skin turns red, sweat pouring from her body as she tries to speak. She only musters an unintelligible word before collapsing on the floor. The room becomes black and becomes as silent as it could be with a twitching corpse scooting around on tile. A perfect model for a CSI commercial.

The substance on the ground is easily mopped up, the microscope appears to be in good condition and the old man places it back on the table, reconnecting it to the television set. The monitor glows white, shining the dark room.

He makes a telephone call to his most trusted colleague. They had to dispose of the body before anyone could find that she was missing. He tells him the plan and how they will become rich and famous. How the world will bow to them. How everyone would die to live forever.

It would not be until many months later, that the inspector found that Sarah Johnson was poisoned by some chemical that they had never seen before. A report was filed and the search to find the old man who took her life was in hot pursuit.

It would not be until a year later that Doctor Ross, an ambitious middle aged botanist, would stop searching for the cure for eternal life. She proposed a plan that would drive the final nail into the corporation's bankruptcy. The business would spend every last dime for the search in the plant that could bring infinite profit. The plant was found in Brazil. Deep in the rainforest, this plant lingers, hiding, waiting to be found again.

That was the proposal, but after the manic search for the grail, the government would acknowledge the plant and register it in the extinct species list of plants and animals. The human impacts on the lumbering of the forest brought an end to the plant that could bring life.

The search for the murderer drew weak and seven years afterward, the police department shut the case. In that same year a new miracle drug was created. This drug could not bring eternal life nor cure cancer. It did make millions though, and the scientists that discovered it remained nameless. The drug was later bought by a company and packaged in little blue pills. A catchy name was added to fit the drug's intention. The name they chose was Viagra.