The Appraisal.

Charlie Wordsborough woke up to a buzzing sound that cut through his Venetian blinds. Stretching his fists in the air, he looked through the window pane only for his eyes to land on the neighbors’ kids throwing big lumps of snow at their dad’s car. It was the irritating alarm the car ever made.

           “Not again,” he mumbled. Jumping from the luxury of his sapphire velvet bed sheets, Christmas was all the way up the air, right from Ms. Jenny’s dazzling Christmas tree on her shade across the road to the wheezing snowflakes that rested on the edges of his beard as he spied from his window shaft.

Still gazing at the snow, the lonely man groomed his beard. I think I can use this holiday to earn some extra cash, what are holidays without Beth. Charlie put his hand to a pencil portrait and in slow short paces of breath, he regretted.

As he picked up the smiling picture of Elizabeth Langston, his reflection from the glass frame talked back to him.

 “You shouldn’t have left her alone.”

Today was marking twelve months when Beth, her little niece and the remnant of her family disappeared in the backyard that late summer evening. As a man in his donkey years, he sipped on his cup of coffee after a few timely twenty minutes of cleaning up and straight he headed for the front door.

The morning blizzard with lots of love had wielded a quarter tone of snow in front of his door that it would take half an hour for a thin tall and skinny man like him to remove the snow worth double his weight.

He stared at his watch in haste and turning the eyes back to his coffee mug, he placed it on the padded burst of his fireplace. Sliding the mahogany drawer just adjacent to the royal blue couch, Charlie flung out five olden keys dusty and heavy that must have seen several fortnights in the dark terror beneath the lowly wood.

He in a hurry folded them beneath his hands heading for the back door. Intact for twelve months, he approached at a faster pace as his blood raced faster pouring the memories of the teenage Beth back into the thinking cap.It was the door she slide through and never returned ever again.

“The guilt would soon cease to come, just forget all about the night.” the words of his therapist ran down his spine as he drove out to work but still he shivered as his hands sweated for the horrors of a missing niece had just been brought to life.

For the first time, he heard the echo of his footsteps clutching on the white tiles as he raced his silk trousers across the hall.

“You are welcome.” the bio-metric machine sang as his index finger struck its pad and with a glitter of the red light that flushed, Charlie found himself smiling instantly as he fixed his glove back to his sleek fingers.

           “I must admit you look stunning today.” said Charlie to the elegant lady occupying the reception desk.

           “Stop it Charlie," Mable giggled beneath her charming smile.

“Any big news today,” he inquired.

           “Tom just signed a memo of employees who would want to earn some extra dime, she punched a bunch of papers. “They will meet him at 6:00 pm in the second board room.” she swirled around in her chair.

“This is fantastic,” Charlie marched to the Christmas tree that shone and tickled all the brilliant luxury out of his mind.

“What plans do you have for the holiday,” he asked advancing back to her desk.

“The good thing is that am not spending it with my family, she paused. “You know restraining orders.”

“Come on, stop messing with me.” he leaned forward, arms resting on the glass edges of the table amid the busy morning of employees arriving and the disturbing noise of the bio-metric. “You are welcome.” He paused looking into her big blue eyes that opened like a rose in the winter frost.

“So what's your bottom line.” she asked shying away from the charming look he had to offer.

           “We will see about that, first I have some work to document nice day Darling.”

He moved majestically whipping off the snowflakes at his scarf nearly hearing them drop on the floor that held the hollow corridor in place.

 Flinging the door behind his basement office, he rested his briefcase on the marble table, no doubt the pharmaceutical company was worth working for and his career as a pharmaceutical researcher was evident on the cash he always checked out.

As he opened his laptop, his eyes caught a wonder through the glass walls; it was for the fifth time that his curiosity and suspicion grew for the ‘Level 4 Clearance’ staff in this facility.

“This must be a hell worth of a project.” he thought, regarding all four of his seniors, men of grey hair except for Tom Harding whom a week before had celebrated his thirty fifth birthday.

They all swiped their clearance cards across the laser detector on the wall and one by one moved into a room whose contents remained anonymous to all employees forgiving the old rich men who frequented the research facility on a quarterly basis for God knows what other motive apart from spilling the research facility with grant money.

Everyone at the workplace had his face glued at the computer, if not, they were exchanging ideas in board rooms and almost all the fellows in the laboratory were having their grips tight at test tubes, looking for new drug molecules to put on market.

As he moved his eyes to the Culturing center, all his colleagues even Sam, the renowned laissez faire was already having his eyes down the microscope lenses giving a meaning to the microbiology sector.

Charlie decided to take his time, cross checking study by study to compile a valid report of the new drug he was working on that could put an end to depression after their groundbreaking discovery.

As the clock ticked smoothly, Charlie had spent twelve hours of proper documentation which tempted him to reach for some ice and his favorite Irish whiskey bottle from which he poured the red flaming liquid down the walls of his champagne glass.

With one shot, he flung the glass as Ice cubes crushed on each other sending an awakening to the soul and mind.

His eyes were flickered by the aluminum wall clock, then slowly he focused at the ticking time piece, 7:30 pm it was.

Charlie quickly grasped his briefcase and headed for the reception using the only stairs that accessed this underground facility.

Quick he tried to open the door, with more energy he pushed his body against it as the door pushed back yet it didn't yet it didn’t even move an inch.

Startled by the fear of being left alone on the cold winter blizzard howling, Charlie headed for the coffee machine in his office to warm up the night as he looked for his phone to beneath the layers of his attire.

As his legs carried him off, his eyes distracted him off to a blue patch of paper lying on the floor just a few feet from the secret room as he had named it.

“Well well well,” he muttered as his curious persona bent down and picked up the most prized piece each employee admired to own. The Level 4 Clearance card.

On a closer look it read, 'Tom Blackgold CEO SUPERCEUTICALS'. Amid all the cold and weird quietness that filled the station, he moved to the secret room as he had named it.

Not a thought of confidentiality struck his mind, but a thirst for knowledge led Charlie to stop and swipe the card at the laser reader.

The door slowly opened tempting him to slide his thin muscles into the new world where his eyes were greeted by a clear map stuck on the back of the door as he swung it closed.

His eyes met the part labeled cryogenic chambers; his eyes struck with terror and doubt, Charlie moved beholding the recent state of the art equipment that his eyes had never seen. The latest transmission electron microscopes, the latest ultra centrifuges, and not forgetting the good looking friability testers his hands felt as he moved along the Disneyland of the company.

"If this is a hub of technological laboratory equipment, why keep it in a top security hideout," his mind continued to do the math’s.

His smile reflected from the marble floor as the map guided his steps far away from the entrance beholding all manner of tidy technological wonders until he reached a steel case seven feet tall and four feet wide with a spinning wheel twice the size of his hands.

 He didn't bother himself of what was inside and with no thought he turned the frigid wheel to the right as the six inches of body thick opened to a humor of cold air.

He stepped into another room full of cryogenic chambers that his eyes couldn’t number but behold in amazement.

Confident in quest he went further and closer to one of the cryogenic chamber, clearing the mist off the glass chamber.

Through the glass stared back the same very eyes that he sure was they belonged to a human being freezing to death.

The air around him grew colder and denser, dropping the map and shuttering its binders on the floor, he flung back, screaming as a seal pup startled by a polar bear and in slow breaths he whimpered in the cold room full of lights beaming a flavor of demonic illusions to the poor soul.

With his muscles shaking and his teeth drumming, Charlie moved into another chamber and when he rubbed the mist off the glass, a young face of little girl looked back; this time with a smile aligned with stiff cheeks and flaked teeth.

He cleared his sight advancing back to the chamber as his stomach drowned into dyspepsia, she smiled more clearly from the chamber and the entire face pattern revealed a lost loved one whose smile he cherished and knew well enough, Beth. Elizabeth Langston. His eyes opened wider as his breath became sequential that his heart pounded as if the Vikings were drumming in the twilight moon.

Down to the middle of the cryogenic chamber was a note stacked and in blue words, Times New Roman font it read.

Elizabeth Langston

Adenochrome P25A.

His hands then reached into the chest pocket of his jacket and out went a phone. Struggling to remain on his feet; he wiped with his glove the tears that his eyes were shedding on his phone screen.

Charlie glanced his camera, taking video and pictures of each of the four chambers he managed to film before he threw up on one of the microscopes.

As the cold shook the terror out of him, he headed for the main door, with a handful of evidence to the unlicensed wizardry going on under his nose for God knows how many years. Forty three of innocent children and some former employees had found haven in the bliss of ice unwillingly.

He burst out in a loud tone of cursing as he face called Tom the man he looked up to in his work career for integrity and success.

“I know everything about the room," Charlie held Tom’s clearance card to his phone camera as his jawbone dropped wide open struggling with replies.

“Oops, welcome to the club.” he muttered.