It was my third week at the job. I had moved into the town less than a month before, it seemed like a lucky break to get a job so soon. But it wasn’t.
























Like I said I had just started working there, I only knew a few people very well and was still learning names. Mainly what I did was package tomatoes to be sold. The work was good, the pay was good, and everyone was very friendly. But then it all started going wrong. Elaine, a lady of about fifty and one of the few people I had become friendly with, asked me to cover her, she was going to the bathroom to smoke.







































“I thought you quite” I said.





























She stared back at me. “I did. Can you cover me or not?”















“Just this one last time, you really need to stop smoking; it’s horrible for your health.”







She rolled he eyes and slipped into the bathroom. If only she had listened to me.









The foreman showed up a few minutes later. I told him she was in the bathroom, not a lie in any way. He seemed satisfied with my answer.



























A few minutes later I heard her screaming in the bathroom stall. We all heard it. It was a scream of pure terror. Not a cry for help, much more panicked than that. By the time I had gotten to the bathroom they had already opened the stall and her lifeless body had fallen out. Cigarettes were scattered on the floor from the box lying empty by my foot. Her body lay face down, her head was turned sideways, and her lifeless eyes seemed to be staring at me. Her once pleasant face was now twisted in the most disturbing expression of fear, pale and openmouthed. The stall had been locked from the inside; there was nothing in there that could have scared her. Someone behind me was calling 911. The paramedics arrived a few minutes later. They flipped her over and checked for a pulse, they found none.












A few hours later, after we had been sent home for the day, I got the news that she had died of a heart attack.


































No one mentioned it at work the next day, but I knew what everyone was thinking. Why did she scream? I had to get to the bottom of it. But now I wish I didn’t.

















I snuck into the ladies room. I did a full inspection of the place. There was no way anyone or anything could have been in the bathroom to scare her. My work station was near the door and nobody had gone in who hadn’t come out. I could now see that door was the only way in. It seemed impossible. If I had known what was in the air vents I would have quite right then and there, but I didn’t.
It was two days later when the next incident took place. This time Kevin, a younger man, jumped off the roof. Or so everyone assumed. But there was no note. No reason. And four witnesses say he was falling backwards and screaming. The only thing me and the other employees heard was the alarm from the car he landed on.
Two tragic accidents in one week, it was more than a coincidence. I had begun to be much more observant. But the only thing I saw was a higher number of bees than ever before. I hate bees. I have ever since my best friend died as a kid after a bee sting. I found out later that he was allergic, but I was still scared to death of them.
The first sign that something serous was going on was when the produce was picked up. I watched the truck drive away, it went the wrong direction. All our products should go to a packaging plant in Kansas, directly to the east. But the truck driver turned west. I asked the foreman about it. He said the truck driver was probably stopping to get something to eat. I said I was sure he was right, but I knew he wasn’t. Something was going on at the plant, something bigger than fast food.
Two weeks later was when it all went down. I was in an accident with one of the machines, I lost my finger. You can see the one that’s gone. It’s my right pinky. They gave me two weeks off when they found out the finger had to go.





























I spent most of the two weeks watching cable TV. I had never really noticed how much working helps people keep their sanity. But it does.
























When the two weeks where over I went to plant ready to work. I didn’t expect to have any trouble doing my job without my finger, I was just glad I still had my thumbs. But when I stepped inside I found the shock of my life. My heart seemed to skip a million beats as I stumbled backwards. In front of me was every employee at the plant, all dead. Some seemed to have run into machinery, some killed themselves, and some killed each other. The foreman and an employee had knives in each other, looks of fearful rage still on their pale dead faces. I was going outside to call the police when I heard a sound behind me. It sounded like buzzing. I turned around and screamed. All the dead employees had turned into giant, walking bees. I stumbled backward, tripping on my untied shoelaces. I lay on the cold cement floor as they closed in. The buzzing sound got louder and louder. I closed my eyes and wait for inevitable. I waited, nothing happened. The buzzing had stopped. I opened my eyes. There were no giant bees. The dead bodies were still human, and still dead. I heard the door opening behind me; I scrambled behind some stacked boxes. Four guys in orange mazmat suits walked in. They walked right past me; I was relieved that they hadn’t noticed me. They walked directly to the end of the room and opened the air vent. They opened it and removed a large canister, like the ones filled with helium. It was seeping air, they closed it. Six more hazmat men came in and began hauling bodies away. The men with the canister walked out holding it cautiously, as if it were a bomb about to explode. Once the last bodies were out they came back with gas cans. I ducked lower and caught a splash of gasoline on my back. Once they had drenched the place they set it ablaze. Slowly the flames crept towards me. I was now alone, the doorway blocked by the deadly flames. I ran to the middle of the room. The glimmer of sunlight on the dew covered grass greeted me through the flicker of the fire. I had to jump it. I ran to the back of the room, the flames were spreading and the amount I had to jump growing. I ran as fast as I could and jumped. I felt the flames licking my body. I landed short. I rolled out of the burning flames onto the cool grass. Laying there staring at the sun, feeling the pain of the burns covering my body, I was sure I was going to die right then and there. But that was when I heard the fire department showed up.
After countless sleepless nights I think I was finally able to piece together what happened. It could have been random draw, or maybe they had us in mind the whole time, but we were the ones they picked. They had to know what effect the gas had on people. They had probably done plenty of testing on animals, but they had to be sure humans were the same. The whole thing had been set up while the place was empty. They put the canister of gas in the air vent and let it slowly seep into the building. They even took our produce to keep the gas isolated. The gas was probably designed as a biological weapon, and I think it did exactly what it was supposed to. The way it worked was to produce hallucinations. But not just hallucinations, hallucinations of a person’s worst fear. I am afraid of bees, Elaine was afraid of spiders, and everyone else had their own fears as well. But the hallucinations did nothing, they couldn’t hurt us. It was up to us to hurt ourselves. And it worked just as it was supposed to. But who was behind the testing? This question had me stumped until I was watching the news one night. They were showing the president drive up in his limo. The camera zoomed in on the limo driver. It was the same man who I had seen driving the produce in the wrong direction.