i like ice cream in my coffee part five

“I want to tell you first off, thank you for this opportunity. You will not regret it,” Doctor Demmy divulged boisterously and quite seriously as he stepped inside the building. Then in a more loosened manner, “It sure is good to see you, Buddy. How in the hell are you?” he asked his med school friend while vigorously shaking the man’s hand, showing enthusiasm for seeing him again and for the job, his words running together. 

“You won’t get any complaints out of me. And I couldn’t be more pleased that you were picked to be here,” he replied, just as enthused, showing Nick quickly into the place while pushing a switch shutting the oversized rock solid doors behind them all in one motion.

“I can’t wait to fill you in on our progress here,” the doctor continued, both of them smiling profusely at each other. 

“Nick, welcome aboard,” he said as he prolifically pressed a systematic set of random numbers into a silver panel on the right side of the large granite entrance. 

Nick heard a loud clack.

“Security.” 

“Okay,” Nick said in a strange way, just now taking a gander and glancing about the aberrant place, his smile fading gradually. His gut gave way to the heebie-jeebies as he now realized there weren’t any other cars in the parking lot, and apparently he was locked in this desolate citadel for some unknown reason.

“Can’t be too careful. We don’t want our hard-earned research to get into the wrong hands. You’ll get used to it,” his old buddy told him, spying him with an enigmatic look. Then he asked Nick, “You were briefed on the measures we take here, weren’t you?”

“Well, yes...sure, I guess...but I didn’t think I would be...incarcerated. Or do I get the code, too?”  Nick tried to act nonchalant and chuckled nervously at his own comment, but he was a little creeped out. He’d never seen the inside of this place, his dream job, before this very minute; and it wasn’t anything like he anticipated or imagined. He felt as if he were in some kind of a scary movie.

An eerie quiet filled the barren hall in which he stood. There was no front entrance or lobby that you would expect when entering an office building, or anywhere for that matter. No reception desk or even an information room. Only the silver metallic walls with a thickness he wouldn’t hazard to estimate, leading off in three different directions. And he didn’t see any doors or even the windows that he had seen on the outside.

Nick gawked around feeling a bit foolish for being spooked. “Uh...my mom’s birthday’s day after tomorrow,” he said stupidly. “I’ll be let out to see her, won’t I?”

There was no answer. The doctor was now speaking to the ceiling, saying, “Dr. Nick Demmy is in the house.” Nick looked up to see what he was talking to.

“You decorate this place?”

“We’re not into artwork, Nick. This structure was designed and built specifically for our research. Come this way, and I’ll explain how we do things around here.” Slightly grinning at the newcomer’s joke, the doctor waved his hand to show Nick the direction.

Their boots were silent as they sashayed down the antechamber to the left.

After walking what Nick judged to be about half way down the corridor, his friend stopped and punched in more arbitrary numbers on another small panel, which he wouldn’t have noticed if he were by himself. A large portion of the wall slid open, upward.

“Nice.”

They stepped into an elevator, and again the doctor used a finger code to shut the sliding door, which took them to another level, Nick guessed. He couldn’t really feel them moving, but he was thinking they must have spent a pretty penny on this high-tech, state-of-the-art secret agent crap. Why would they need all this concealment?

Nick had agreed to live here and already had his things sent over, as requested, two days ago. He got rid of his apartment, changed his mailing address and canceled his life, basically, just to jump at this chance to work for the most prestigious family in the field of brainology. He wanted to be a part of their exciting new world of study. This was exactly why he decided to be a doctor to begin with, to probe the human mind and all of its complexities and capabilities.

Demmy had been interested in the thinker since he could remember. Even as a child, he was fascinated with comic book characters like Superman, because they had powers unusual for a normal person; except he’d always believed all people have untapped powers. They simply don’t know how to use them. He projected enormous potential of the psyche aptitude with the brain being heterogeneous and elements of it indolent.

Doctor Demmy spent his life, thus far, trying to prove his theories. He had gone as far as to leap off the roof of his parents’ house at the age of five, trying to fly. He would sit for hours as a teenager staring at a glass or pen, any tangible object, concentrating to lift it with his perspicacity. Even in college, he tried to read people’s thoughts, always bugging his fellow classmates with, “Am I right?” Were they really thinking what he thought they were thinking?

However, as he matured and gained more wisdom and education, he began to understand the brain itself had not been fully mapped out. There were entities unknown, unexplained, uncharted, unacknowledged. The field of neuroscience was just a guessing game.

That idea alone had peaked his interest further, since he thought he could now prove his theories of the mysterious mental power in which he believed and discover the closet gifts of which he knew the human race was adroit. And Nick was more determined than ever to substantiate this hazy world of wonder any way he could.