FicWad

Slash woke the next morning to the sound of rustling paper. In the blissful state of semi-consciousness, he was sure he could hear Izzy mumbling away to himself. On opening his eyes, his heart dropped as he saw Steven sitting in the middle of the floor.

Pushing himself into a sitting position, Slash asked, "What are you doing?"

Steven looked up from whatever he was reading and handed it to Slash. It was a flimsy news-sheet, badly copied and stapled together. Its title, /Truth Be Told/, ran across the top, two suspicious looking eyes flanking it. Slash quickly scanned through it, eyes catching snippets of UFO's, mysterious disappearances and a number of other strange and intriguing stories.

"Steven." Slash cocked an eyebrow. "What the fuck is this?"

Grinning, the bubbly blonde pushed a small pile of similar badly printed magazines towards him.

"Conspiracy theory zines, man." He pushed a mop of stray hair from his eyes. "Picked 'em up while you were sleeping."

Taking a cigarette from a packet, Slash stared at him through tired eyes. "Why?"

"They might help us find this Izzy guy you're on about." Steven shrugged, looking deflated for a second before perking up again. "Anyway, I spoke to the guy at the news-stand and he said we need to hang around the comic book stores and head shops. Says they hang around them at night."

"You're making it sound like some fuckin' wildlife show." Slash sighed and blew a stream of smoke into the air.

Steven's face dropped and he pulled the cheap magazines back towards him.

"I'm trying to fuckin' help you Slash. But if you want to sit here and mope about your missing boyfriend, then fine." He gathered the papers into his arms and stood. "I'll go somewhere else and leave you to it."

Reaching out, Slash grabbed the hem of Steven's trousers, pulling him back to the floor with a thud.

"I didn't say I wasn't up for this." He sighed, raking a hand through his curls. "It just seems... stupid, that's all. I mean, do people really believe this?"

A grin again broke Steven's face as he held up the zines. "Oh course they fuckin' do, man! Otherwise people wouldn't read this shit."

Nodding Slash smiled and reached to take one of the papers from the pile.

"Okay Stevie, if you think this gonna help then I'm in."

~~~~

The bed felt weird. It wasn't uncomfortable, it was just where it was that made Izzy nervous. He'd slept fitfully all night, finally waking as the light changed. It wasn't natural light, rather a cleverly controlled lamp that simulated the gentle morning sun.

Considering he was sleeping in an underground bunker, the room he'd been given was quite homely, almost welcoming. The grey walls had been painted a soothing lilac with book lined shelves propped against one wall. An overgrown spider plant dangled from one shelf, its spiny leaves nearly brushing the floor. A small room housed the bathroom while one wall was covered in frosted glass. Behind that was the simulation lamp that changed from night to day and back again, every motion a pre-determined computer pattern. This was, as Dr. Martin had said, the guest quarters of Mesa.

Fresh clothes had been set on a chair and Izzy was grateful of them as he slowly dressed. Beyond the white painted door was the stark, grey reality of Mesa. With expert movements, Izzy fastened the specially constructed shirt, the wings spreading and easing from a night of being curled up. It was almost as if they'd been expecting him... It felt good to have the wings free and to have room to stretch them. Despite Mesa's odd, and often disconcerting, smells Izzy had noticed that the soft, musky smell was returning to the feathers. It was something he hadn't sensed in a while and it was nice to have it back. It like a touch of home, a reminder of where he'd come from.

Slowly he opened the door and quietly stepped into the empty corridor. Anyone who needed to be anywhere was long gone, giving Izzy the time and privacy to get to Dr. Martin's lab. "Just follow the yellow line, Jeffrey," he'd said. Izzy had noticed the different coloured lines on his way to the medical bay the night before. According to the doctor, yellow went to his lab, green to the cafeteria, blue to their silo. He hadn't explained where the red line went and Izzy wasn't sure he wanted to know. Dr. Martin had gone on to explain that Mesa was spilt into four sectors, each one cornered by a massive ICBM silo. The four silos were spread over a twenty mile radius with each sector dedicated to a different military operation. He'd been told that currently only two silos were loaded. Dr. Martin's was currently lying empty, being used for other purposes. The other, as Izzy had discovered, was very, very empty.

Izzy meandered along the tunnel, eyes on the yellow line and wings stretched to their full span in the wide tunnel. He'd spent a couple of hours in Dr. Martin's medical area, being checked out by a team of very attentive medical personnel. Every bone, muscle and nerve seemed to have been tested as they'd fed him as many military-grade meals as he could eat. Thankfully the only problem they'd discovered was a faint rope burn around his throat. They'd said the shock of the last few days would manifest itself at some point. They just didn't know when or how.

He stopped in front of a set of giant doors. They looked no different from the numerous other doors he'd been through. Izzy quickly looked over the doors, looking for a way to signal to those inside that he'd arrived. After a fruitless search he resorted to pounding a fist against the metal. It echoed and reverberated through the tunnel, making Izzy jump. The door creaked open a little and the snowy white head of Dr. Martin poked out. His face creased into a smile when he saw Izzy.

"Hello Jeffrey. Come on in. And next time you want to get in." He signalled to a small, unobtrusive box to the right of the doors. "Just open the box and press the green button."

Izzy gave a weak smile and followed the doctor through the tiny gap.

They stepped into an atrium and Izzy stopped, stunned by what he saw. Plants, like none he'd ever seen, crawled up the walls and towards the massive glass roof. Flowers of every colour and type wrapped themselves around the trees that twined towards the light that flooded through the glass. The trees strangely shaped leaves edged over the glass, giving parts of the room a murky greenish hue. The scent was amazing, soft and earthy, while little insects and birds buzzed around, occasionally resting in the foliage.

"It's amazing, isn't it?" Dr Martin's voice pierced his astonishment.

Izzy just nodded dumbly, his jaw still open.

"It's all like you Jeffrey. They're all clones or merged DNA." A bird landed on his hand and he showed it to Izzy.

The tiny bird was beautiful, gossamer thin wings folded against its pale pink body. Rather than feathers, it had a soft downy fur and the wings were made of feathers which were completely clear, the light refracting through them. It stared at Izzy for a moment, its head cocked to one side, before giving a tiny chirrup and taking off. Izzy tracked it, watching as it spiralled upwards towards the artificial light that streamed through the glass.

"Alas," the doctor continued, "they'll never see proper daylight." He smiled at Izzy. "Now come. We must talk."

Izzy followed him, his neck still craning to look at the menagerie as they walked through a door in one wall.

The door clicked shut, closing them off from the atrium. They stood in a low roofed room. Like every other room in Mesa it was lit by bright fluorescent lights. The walls were bare grey concrete and desks lined them, covered with various apparatus. A few doors led off into what Izzy assumed could only be other rooms and laboratories. There was an examination bed in the middle of the floor, a seat and various wheeled trays beside it. Somewhere, a stereo quietly hummed, classical music filling the otherwise dead room with a bit of life.

Dr. Martin gestured towards the padded table. "Please, sit. Is there anything you want?"

He pulled himself up onto the table. "A cigarette would be great."

The doctor frowned for a moment before letting himself smile. "We don't allow smoking down here, fire risks and whatnot. But I'm sure we can bend the rules a little."

Izzy watched as he walked over to a desk and bent over the phone, talking quickly and quietly into it. It was over in a moment and the doctor turned back to him, sitting in the seat beside the table.

"Someone's going to bring some over in a moment." he said with a smile.

~~~~

Slash and Steven spent the day trawling through every scruffy zine in the pile until the light began to fade. Flopping back onto the bed, Slash sighed, hands raking through his hair. His hair was now scruffier than normal, hands having raked it into shaggy tufts.

"It's no good, man," he sighed as he reached for his cigarettes, sticking one between his lips and lighting it.

"What do you mean "no good"?" Steven demanded. "We're only tickling the tip of the iceberg here, dude. There's plenty more places to look." Slash's leather landed on his face. "Get up, we're going out."

Slash struggled to his feet and draped his jacket around his shoulders as he silently glared daggers into the back of Steven's head.

"This is no time to go and get loaded, Steven," he moaned.

Steven turned and grinned at him, fluffy hair falling into his eyes.

"No, but it is time to go weirdo hunting Saul."