The Poisonous Seaweed

The Poisonous Seaweed
by Ally


It was a rainy, cold night in Chicago on October 23rd, but that didn’t stop the two boys who leaped out of an apartment door on 24th Street, raced down the road, made a left turn at breakneck speed, and finally slowed and stopped at a deserted alley.
The alley was like any typical Chicago alley. The pavement was wet from rain, there was graffiti etched on crumbling brick walls, and shattered old beer cans lined the path with bits of sharp glass. At the end of the alley was a house. The house once may have been expensive because of the overlook of Lake Michigan. Now, however, it was abandoned and useless. The windows were cracked, the paint was peeling, and the weathervane was battered and broken. One whole side of the house was broken in, with large, deadly chunks of pointed wood sticking out in every direction. The one remaining shutter flapped and fluttered in the breeze like a ghostly green bird. The once wonderful view of the lake now only showed the toxic, reddish slime that the large body of water had become, a deadly, still mass where no fishing, swimming or boating would ever take place. It was perfect haunted house material.
One of the boys shoved the other one. “C’mon, you know what we said! Twenty minutes, no flashlight. Don’t be a chicken!” The other boy remained doubtful. “Chicken! Bawk, bawk, bawk, bawk!” Finally the other boy took a slow step forward. The moonlight reflected on his pale, frightened face. His blue eyes shone with horror and his blond hair appeared to be white in the dim light. He gulped, steeled himself, and took another step forward. Slowly, he inched himself to the front porch, took a deep breath, and then opened the door and stepped inside.
He was met by a humongous crystal chandelier, fallen from the high arched ceiling. Its glass bulbs tinkled in the draft, making an eerie clinking. Beyond the foyer which housed the chandelier was a dining room with a large oak table. Next to that was a hallway with marble pillars and to the left of the hallway was a living room with expensive couches. But the boy didn’t even see the living room and hallway. He had eyes only for the dining room and, more precisely, the oak table. The table was set for one. The house had been abandoned for twenty years!
The boy gave a piercing scream and turned to the door, grasping the handle, but it would not turn! He screamed again. One by one, the glass bulbs on the chandelier burst, spraying the screeching boy with bits of glass. Then a rasping voice said “Well, well,” and the boy passed out.
***
It was pitch black in the room. The bed, nightstand, dresser, and desk were submerged in complete darkness. The unconscious boy, who lay in the corner of the room, moaned and twitched, then lay still again. Suddenly the door swung open and light flooded into the room, coming from a lit candlestick in the hand of a ghastly man. The man was grinning maliciously. His hair was black and he had a large, pointy mustache. His thin body was quivering with excitement. Behind him, a mangy Doberman shuffled along. Look what we have here!” exclaimed the man. He kicked the boy awake. The boy huddled, whimpering with fear, in the corner. The man’s boot collided with him another time. “What’s your name?” He thundered. “l-l-Luke,” the boy stammered. “I’m the great Dr. Calmen! “ What are you good at?” The man yelled. “Snowboarding and skateboarding,” replied a very nervous Luke. The man scowled, and then a grin slowly overcame his face. “I have a use for you!” he declared. The door was slammed shut on Luke. Dr. Calmen hurried to his lab. He knelt over his tubers and wicked potions, pouring, mixing, stirring and cackling madly. All through the night he poured various liquids and added clumps of evil ingredients with a stench only Dr. Calmen could stand. Finally, after working for eight straight hours, he stood, stretched, and cackled once more, staring at his hideous creation. He had a vat of green acidic fluid that bubbled and churned like a miniature sea. The vat was fifty sizes larger than a large bathtub. Dr. Calmen suddenly opened a trapdoor set in the bottom of his laboratory. Inside was... seaweed! Tons of stinking, smelling, wet seaweed occupied a circle room one hundred feet in circumference. Dr. Calmen walked over to the side of the room and pressed a button. The vat fell over, and all the awful goo tumbled in a tormenting river into the hatch and onto the seaweed. The odor it produced was so awful, and the air so thick with acidic smoke that not even that wicked scientist could stay in the room much longer.
So Dr. Calmen rushed upstairs. Humming quietly, he prepared dinner for himself. Remembering Luke, he grabbed a piece of bread and filled a glass with sour milk. He rushed upstairs to feed his prisoner the small rations. Once he and Luke had both finished, Dr. Calmen went to bed.
***
Luke was starving. According to his watch, it was 2 p. m., and all he had had to eat and drink in fourteen hours was a piece of bread and a glass of sour milk. What was more, he was scared to death that he would never see his family again. Suddenly, he heard loud barking, he rushed to the window. Peeping out, he saw his corgi, Duke, loyally barking at the house. “He must have tracked my scent,” Luke thought. Uh-oh- duke would be no match for that Doberman! He tried to warn Duke by shouting “go away!” through the window. It was a big mistake. Upon seeing Luke’s face, Duke just barked louder. It was too late. The Doberman rushed out and attacked Duke. Grabbing Duke’s lifeless body, it trotted back into the house. As Luke sobbed, the door suddenly opened. Dr. Calmen stood in the doorway, looking angry. He tossed a sprig of lettuce, a piece of cheese, and a water bottle. Then he took a jumble of iron from his massive lab coat pocket, and proceeded to handcuff and chain Luke in the most uncomfortable way possible. He left Luke sobbing desperately, the food already devoured.
Downstairs, Dr. Calmen was watching with satisfaction as a large truck with ‘Harrison Beauty Products’ inscribed on the side dumped his tons of seaweed in to the back of the truck. They finished, gave Dr. Calmen the check he had earned for selling his seaweed, got in the truck and spread away. You may be wondering why beauty products would have anything to do with seaweed, but it happens that seaweed lotion is one of the best things for your face. Dr. Calmen marched inside smiling evilly. He would give it two days for the poisonous seaweed disease to spread.
Those two days were the worst of Luke’s life. After three of the worst meals he had ever received and a day and a half had gone by, Dr. Calmen came in and placed a huge birthday cake and a whole gallon of orange juice on the floor and left. Luke’s eyes lit up and he lunged for the cake... but found he could not reach it. The evil man had positioned the chains so Luke could not reach the cake. He had simply put it there to torment him. Luke screamed in frustration.
After the two days were up, Dr. Calmen turned on the television. The news was stock full about a spreading disease which caused people to have strange bruises covering their back, then to go into a coma and die. Grinning, Dr. Calmen picked up his phone and dialed 911.
***
Dawn Olleireuam, top detective, zoomed down the streets of Chicago in her gray unmarked police vehicle to the address the man had said... a strange address indeed. Something was definitely fishy if the address was ‘in the alley between 2323 Dark Street and 23023 Dark Street’. So she had bought along fourteen of her best cops. Pulling into the alley, Dawn stepped out of the distasteful van (she would have preferred one of her seventeen limos) and marched purposefully toward the old door. She grasped the knocker and rapped twice. Only a few seconds later, the door was pulled open by a man in a tuxedo with a broad, thick mustache. “Please, please come in me lady,” he drawled in a strange accent. ‘Would you allow me to take ze coat?” Dawn handed him her four hundred dollar fox fur coat. “Take a zeat in the dining room, would you, and wait for me to begin my story. Would you care for zome tea?” asked the strange man. Dawn glanced around the run-down home skeptically. If this was another hoax, she would resign. Who would dare try to trick Dawn Olleireuam! “Ze tea is ready, me lady!” The man called to Dawn. ‘Now, let me begin with my tale. I am positive that you vill find it very helpful. One day I vas valking home from vork when I zee the strangest...” “Where do you work?” interrupted Dawn. “I vork zelling beauty products of zeaweed to Harrison’s Beauty Products.” I have given them a vat of me best seaweed just two days ago-vhen ze trouble began. You zee, I vas valking home from vork, and I just happen to zee ze strangest man. He is all dressed in black and his head is bald. He has a hoop piercing in his left ear. What is even stranger is zat he has no right ear, and a very big beard. Now as I walk along, zis strange man happens to follow me. He follows me until I get to my house, and I’m very afraid now. Zo, I take out my zell phone and start to call you. But before I can do zo, zis man tackles me! “No police saw you?” Asked Dawn. “Vell, ve vere in my alley. Anyways, zis man tackles and my zell phone falls down ze gutter. Zo I zay, zis a crazy man who broke my very expensive zell phone. Then I zay, stop it right now! Ze man does not listen. He zay, I can see you are not the right person to spray my disease upon, and I zee zat he has a spray bottle full of green liquid. Zen he dashes avay, and I rush inside, and call zee cops, and you come!”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, stop right there! A likely story you have spun up for me here. Do you have any proof of what happened? And I have some questions for you, too. First of all, how can people have a disease in a spray bottle? Second of all, how can a cell phone fall into a gutter? Gutters are on the roofs of houses, not on the ground. Plus, I’m going to call up Harrison’s Beauty Products and ask them if you have ever sold them some ‘zeaweed.’ Wait, I don’t even know his name! Guys, I’m ninety nine point nine percent sure that this is a hoax. Handcuff him; figure out his name and a few other things about him; ask him any questions you might have and mine. I’m going to search for some clues.
***
It had been a long day for Dr. Calmen, and Luke. Dr. Calmen had been interrogated all day, weaving a web of lies based on his story and trying not to trip over the threads that made up the web. He had very closely escaped spending the night at the jailhouse. As for Luke, he had spent the day in Dr. Calmens’ hidden room beneath the laboratory. There were some gobs of green water in some places, and Luke made sure he didn’t go near those places. This left about three feet of space for him. To make matters worse, it stank so bad he had to plug his nose for fourteen hours.
Even more unlucky, Dr. Calmen was ready to unleash his evil plan upon Luke. He marched Luke back up to the room, but instead of chaining him he ordered his Doberman to attack the wall. Luke watched, confused and astonished, as the dog ripped away the wood. Soon he came to some piping, and stopped obediently turning back to his master, his muzzle bloody and tongue lagging. The evil man strode toward the broken section of the wall. He ripped out a piece of the pipe with inhuman strength. Snarling, he turned and banged Luke hard on the head, in a specific spot that could cause... “Where am I? Who am I?” asked Luke... amnesia.
***
Back in her office, Dawn was reading the newspaper. Things were looking grim for Chicago. She better organize herself. Tackle things one at a time, Olleireuam, she thought. First thing: the Cubs lost the game, again. Second thing: A boy had gone missing. The boy had lived on 24th Street, and disappeared October 23rd. Memorize that address! Third thing: the disease that the strange man had talked about was serious. The whole city was in severe quarantine. The people who had not yet acquired the disease were requested to wear strange bubble suits, and no one was allowed on the streets or out of the city. The disease caused people to have strange bruises appear on their backs. These bruises would scab over, and then the person would go into a coma. Fourth thing: the strange man. She had discovered his name was Lester Tenneco, and he had a son named Quentin who wasn’t home. Quentin was twelve years old, with brown hair, blue eyes, and dimples. The man refused to say Quentin’s whereabouts, a fact that still troubled her. She had called Harrison’s Beauty products, and they said that a man named Lester Tenneco had sold a batch of seaweed two days ago who lived in the right location. Dawn tried to make connections between the problems. Cubs are bad because of the sickness? The sickness is because a kid disappeared? Dawn finally came up with one that might work, but before she could check it, the phone rang. “Hello, this is Dawn Olleireuam,” she said. As she listened to the voice, a look of concern spread across her face. “I’m on it.” Dawn said urgently then she hung up and spun around. She strode over to her laptop and started to type. While she was waiting for one site to download, she started to check her connection again. It was unlikely, but possible. She would have to do some investigating later today.
***
Dr. Calmen finished telling Luke-Quentin, now-his new identity. He stood up, stretched, and marched out of the room, instructing Quentin to follow him. He picked up his phone and dialed a number. “Hello, Miss. Olleireuam. I do believe I have some new information Quentin seems to have picked up. Please come soon. What? Aren’t you a very high-ranking detective, you should be allowed to roam ze streets, even in zuch peril. Very well, then.” He hung up.
Soon Dawn pulled into the alley. She had finally been allowed her limo. She had ordered a patrol of eleven cops into the building before her, and she was surprised to discover two new people. The first was Quentin. Quentin had black hair and brown eyes. Uh-oh, this would not fit her connection! Calm down, Olleireuam. The second one was a disheveled man with a cigar in his mouth. He had no right ear. Upon seeing Dawn, he grunted meditatively. Quentin stepped forward and recited in a strangely mechanical voice. He said “I was walking home. I saw a man. He had no right ear. He is here as you can see. I thought he was strange. He had a spray bottle full of green stuff. His name is Tom Livel. I told my dad. My dad told the police. The police took him here, to my home. My home? Huh...” ‘Quentin that’s enough. Quentin is a little... strange.” explained Mr. Tenneco. “Now you must make your choice. This strange man with a spray bottle who fits my description completely, or me! You should know the right choice.” “I do.” Said Dawn solemnly. ‘I believe that I should convict... Tom Livel.” The police stepped forward with their handcuffs. Then Quentin suddenly started to shout: my home! This is not my home! No- 24th street, alley, dare, chandelier, dog, chains, cake, pit, people, ripped open wall, super strength, Quentin!!!! No-not Quentin! I’m Luke!!!! He dyed my hair and gave me colored contact lenses. Suddenly Dawn understood. This was the missing child! Her connection was correct! “All right, so-called Mr. Tenneco, you’ve got some explaining to do!
***
After Dr. Calmen had come clean and Luke had been returned to his family, everyone was happy. Dr. Calmen had been interrogated again, but this time he told all the right answers, including how he made the potion which started the disease. It turns out that since so much arsenic was in the lake, all Dr. Calmen had had to do was add a few more ingredients and the seaweed became dangerous. It was also discovered that in earlier experiments the doctor had gave him super strength. However, Dr. Calmen did not fight back. He gave them the antidote. He said “This will stop the disease, but I have no idea how to give it back to everyone,” he said. “I just might have something for you,” said Tom Livel. “An idea: you could pour some in a lake. It will eventually evaporate and rain upon the citizens. We could request all diagnosed outside when it rains.” “Good idea,” said Dawn. And so, after six months the city was cleared of the disease, with only about a hundred people dead from the epidemic. Dr. Calmen was put in a highly protected jail cell. Dawn was paid and with the money bought yet another limo. Luke was also paid, but his mother made him put it in the bank. Tom Livel became a doctor. The house in the alley was knocked down, and the epidemic left just a small scar on the great city of Chicago.