Drabble_weekly Challenge 401 - Spared
Jun. 15th, 2024 12:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
m_findlowTitle: Spared
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 300 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Challenge 401 - Single at ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
drabble_zone
drabble_zoneSummary: A search for life is not entirely in vain. A triple drabble.
‘Anything?’ Jack asked, watching Tosh and Owen knelt on the floor, checking through the debris with gloved hands.
Tosh shook her head. ‘Sorry, nothing yet,’ she replied, moving carefully to the left so that she didn't cut herself on any of the broken glass.
Jack sighed. What a goddamn mess. It wasn't bad enough to find out there'd been alien experiments going on here. Now the people they'd been hoping to capture had escaped before they'd arrived, with no knowing who they were or any way to trace them, and having destroyed all the work they'd been doing here in this makeshift lab. He had no doubt they'd simply start up again somewhere else. It was how much suffering would be inflicted until they were able to find them again. When Jack did find them he vowed to inflict a whole lot of suffering himself.
The room reeked of formaldehyde and disinfectant as he gingerly stepped through broken glass and bits of wood. There was also a charred smell from where they'd attempted and failed to set fire to the whole place, resorting to simply smashing and breaking when the fire didn't take hold.
He nearly missed it as his foot brushed by, just inches from where a single glass vial glinted, nestled amongst a pile of rubble. He brushed the debris away, revealing a single jar with an embryo inside, still alive. It glowed a peach colour and was warm to the touch. He had no way of telling what it was, or what experiments had been planned for it when it reached appropriate maturity, but it had survived. It alone out of hundreds of specimens, far from its home world, had survived the worst that planet Earth could throw at it. It wasn't much, but it was something.
‘Anything?’ Jack asked, watching Tosh and Owen knelt on the floor, checking through the debris with gloved hands.
Tosh shook her head. ‘Sorry, nothing yet,’ she replied, moving carefully to the left so that she didn't cut herself on any of the broken glass.
Jack sighed. What a goddamn mess. It wasn't bad enough to find out there'd been alien experiments going on here. Now the people they'd been hoping to capture had escaped before they'd arrived, with no knowing who they were or any way to trace them, and having destroyed all the work they'd been doing here in this makeshift lab. He had no doubt they'd simply start up again somewhere else. It was how much suffering would be inflicted until they were able to find them again. When Jack did find them he vowed to inflict a whole lot of suffering himself.
The room reeked of formaldehyde and disinfectant as he gingerly stepped through broken glass and bits of wood. There was also a charred smell from where they'd attempted and failed to set fire to the whole place, resorting to simply smashing and breaking when the fire didn't take hold.
He nearly missed it as his foot brushed by, just inches from where a single glass vial glinted, nestled amongst a pile of rubble. He brushed the debris away, revealing a single jar with an embryo inside, still alive. It glowed a peach colour and was warm to the touch. He had no way of telling what it was, or what experiments had been planned for it when it reached appropriate maturity, but it had survived. It alone out of hundreds of specimens, far from its home world, had survived the worst that planet Earth could throw at it. It wasn't much, but it was something.
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Date: 2024-06-15 09:36 am (UTC)