Nov 10, 20172 min read

Garden Grove: 4 Sick Workers and Senility – Bruce Copeland’s Office by LV Gaudet

Garden Grove Cover - McNally - front cover

Stanley Rutthers stood in his boss’s office nervously gripping his hard hat in his hands.

His boss, Bruce Copeland, sat at his desk looking anything but relaxed.

“What do you mean they’re all sick?” Copeland demanded.

“The whole damned crew had to be taken to the hospital,” Stanley said. “They all can’t stop puking. Most of them can’t even stand up. Some of them are in intensive care.”

“What the hell?” Copeland almost yelled it.

“Looks like some kind of poisoning,” Stanley said.

“Poison? What the hell’d poison an entire crew?” Copeland demanded.

“Not what,” Stanley said, “who.”

Copeland just stared at him, dumbstruck.

“Dave said a little old lady gave them pastries just before they all started getting sick,” Stanley said.

Copeland just couldn’t believe it.

“First the site and equipment keeps getting vandalized,” Copeland said angrily. “Then someone messes around with our plans, and I still think it was that damned Lezkowitz that somehow did it, he’d do anything to steal a job off me for his own company. Then we dig up some damned old skull. And now we have little old ladies poisoning an entire work crew? Shit, damn, and mother! What the hell is going on here?”

Stanley just shook his head. He was mystified.

“How long are they going to be off?” Copeland asked. “Any idea?”

“A few of them didn’t eat too many, maybe a couple of days. Others-,” Stanley shrugged, “I just don’t know. A lot of the guys are in pretty bad shape.”

“Damn!”

Copeland’s mind was running fast, thinking hard. Somehow, this had to work out.

“Can we find guys from anywhere else?” Copeland asked. “Guys off injured? Pull some from other jobs?”

Stanley shook his head.

“Best we can do is pull a crew off the Anc-Chor project.”

“No,” Copeland said. “That won’t do. We can’t do that. That project is already behind with all the time wasted trying to fit things together and redoing them because of the project owner’s secretiveness.”

The Anc-Chor project is another of Copeland and Howe Construction, Excavation and Land Development’s projects, and one that Bruce Copeland often wished he had lost the tender on despite the profits it was making for his company. The Anc-Chor Corporation is run by a single man, the majority shareholder and CEO, Mr. Chornelhus. The Anc-Chor project is a top-secret project that appears to be some large laboratory facility, although Mr. Chornelhus is completely secretive about the purpose of the facility being built.

He muttered something unintelligible to himself.

“Guess we’ll have to hire a new green crew,” Copeland sighed.

He was not happy about this. An untrained green crew would work much slower and make more mistakes, slowing down the already behind Garden Grove project even more.

“I think so,” Stanley agreed. “It’ll put us even further behind on the Garden Grove project.”

“We have no choice.”

“No, we don’t.”