Home Is Where the Heart Is

Dr. Roland Bennings examined four distinct basketball-sized lumps of masticated food on his steel lab worktable. There was a fibrous greyish-brown lump, a stringy green lump, a bumpy dark white lump, and a smooth pale-yellow lump.

“Hmm,” Dr. Bennings said as he retrieved the pen tucked behind his ear and poked at the nearest lump. “Skirt steak, string beans, white bread, and corn.”

Dr. Bennings cut off a generous slice of each lump and took his meal into the ship’s kitchenette. He sat at the square table in the corner, taking his usual spot in the seat against the wall. He tucked his napkin into his collar and enjoyed his semi-digested lunch.

The muted flavor of each slice confirmed his guesses. Dr. Bennings smiled. He helped himself to a hunk of lumpy bread. It had a strong acidic aftertaste. He knew he’d waited too long to retrieve his lunch from the stomach, but he’d lost track of time, engrossed in his work, his tiring experiments finally starting to yield results.

“At least I saved myself a trip to the small intestine,” he said aloud to no one.

After lunch, Bennings climbed the ladder from the lab to the helm. He took a seat in the bulky padded pilot’s seat of the cockpit and punched a few buttons on the console, bringing the central computer to life. He checked the fuel levels first – 86%. He’d been quite frugal when it came to flights, usually just taking the ship to the lungs and back.

Dr. Bennings then selected Vitals from the computer’s menu.

“Oxygen levels – 28%” flashed on the screen in bright red. On his previous check, the levels sat at 56% in a shade of healthy green. But Bennings wasn’t worried. The figures were calibrated for a crew of four. He took a deep breath, filling his lungs with clean, recirculated air, satisfied he no longer had to share it.

Dr. Bennings donned his bulky exploration suit and attached the tool belt. He unhooked the clamshell grabber from the wall and pulled a thick black garbage bag from the supply room shelf. He attached his helmet and turned the lock wheel of the compression chamber hatch. The industrial clock above the heavy steel door counted down from 30. Dr. Bennings had made so many trips outside that he had lost count, still, he found it exhilarating each time the counter hit 0.

The steel doors slowly separated and Dr. Bennings was faced with the familiar darkness. He turned on his helmet light and was given a concentrated, illuminated view of the vast pink trail before him. He took a breath and stepped out onto the surface. His boots did an admirable job of gripping the slick surface, but Dr. Bennings still took his time on the walk. He pressed a button on the control panel on the left arm of his suit. The external lights of the ship turned on all at once, giving Bennings a north star to find his way back home.

The walk from the right atrium, where the ship was docked, to the implanted valve on the pulmonary artery was only about 1.5 inches, but due to Bennings’ current size, it was the equivalent of a 4-mile journey. When he arrived at the valve, he lifted it open, aired out the trash bag, unclipped the grabber from his belt and proceeded to pull out the clumps of plaque that had stuck to the walls of the artery. Dr. Bennings chuckled as he gradually filled the bag. The mission that had brought him there was the cumulation of thousands of hours of research, experimentation, and labor, not to mention an unprecedented level of funding. But now, his work simply involved a cheap hardware store tool and a 99-cent garbage bag. Dr. Bennings returned to the ship with a bag stuffed with plaque and the satisfaction from a hard day’s work. He always fancied himself a model house guest, trying his best to leave home in a better shape than he found it. He placed the bag in the freezer of the supply room, adding to a mountain of filled garbage bags.

As he finished his dinner of semi-digested chicken Kiev and what he guessed was some sort of fruit tart, Dr. Bennings found himself uncharacteristically restless. He decided to take a night-time drive. He climbed into the cockpit and lifted off from right atrium.

It was a relatively short flight to the cavernous sinus. It was not his ultimate destination, but due to the sensitivity of the terrain, he had to walk the rest of the way. He put on his suit but left his tools and supplies behind. This was a purely observational excursion. The only thing he needed was a blanket.

He unfurled the fire blanket at the base of the medial canthus. It was a soft and spongey surface, but also highly sensitive. The blanket, a smooth piece of the silicone-coated fiberglass, ensured his host would not be bothered. He took a seat and enjoyed the view.

Senator Bill Longerman was in his kitchen, washing dishes, passing them off to his wife Melanie Robespierre-Longerman for drying. A quiet night in, Dr. Bennings concluded. When they finished the dishes, Senator Longerman kissed his wife, her right eye coming incredibly close to Dr. Bennings. But Bennings did not so much as flinch. He knew she could stare her husband directly in the eye still not see him.

Senator Longerman went upstairs to his study where his bullmastiff Rosco was curled up on the tan leather chair.

“Rosco, what are you doing up there?” Dr. Bennings said with a smile.

“Rosco, what are you doing up there?” Senator Longerman said.

Longerman gently tugged the dog by the collar. Rosco hopped off and settled on the rug. Longerman took his seat and pulled over the two-tier steel cart which contained his current nighttime project – a model of a 17th century Dutch golden schooner. On the lower shelf was a corked glass bottle that would soon be the ship’s home. When the Senator first began assembling his model, Dr. Bennings could not comprehend how it would possibly fit inside that bottle. He felt a tad silly when he found out how it was done. A career scientist at the top of his field, and he couldn’t wrap his head around the idea of a collapsable model.

The ship was nearly complete; with just the plates of the hull left to attached. It was a soothing hobby, one that Bennings could have seen himself pursuing in another life. The Senator removed the pin pusher from his tool kit and began attaching one of the curved plates. As he silently worked, Bennings began to grow sleepy.

An alarm woke Dr. Bennings from his slumber. But this wasn’t the familiar 7:00 AM alarm from Senator Longerman’s bedside clock radio. This alarm was harsh and abrasive. Dr. Bennings realized it was the low oxygen alert ringing off in his suit. By the time he exited the decompression chamber, he found himself severally lightheaded. Instead of taking a rest, he climbed up to the cockpit and flew to the lungs to continue his research.

By the time Dr. Bennings finally took a pause, he saw that he had worked straight through breakfast and lunch. He was tempted to push through, but he knew missing another meal would only hinder his work. Up arriving at the stomach, Dr. Bennings was met with a startling discovery – it was completely empty. Something was wrong, he told himself. Senator Longerman never missed a meal, let alone two. He wondered if perhaps, in a strange coincidence, the Senator was just as busy as him. Had their host-symbiont relationship had transcended to a new level?

Eventually, Dr. Bennings located a substance in the stomach. It was a pill. The white, ovular objected bobbed up and down in the gastro-juices. He lowered the claw from the underside compartment of the ship and pulled the pill inside. As he traveled from the helm down to the retraction dock, he racked his brain for possibilities of the pill’s origins. A cholesterol medication perhaps? But that wouldn’t need to be taken on an empty stomach. Had the wife persuaded him to try one of those new intermittent fasting diets? When Bennings reached the dock, the answer was spelled out clearly for him. Etched across the pill was a message:

BENNINGS ALIVE

Bennings ran across the slick surface of the sclera, slipping and sliding the entire way to the medial canthus where he saw Senator Longerman approaching his car. He could tell they were in a parking lot somewhere.

“Turn around,” Bennings said.

Longerman unlocked his Lincoln Continental.

“Turn around,” Bennings said again.

He started the car and backed out of the space.

“Turn. Around. Now!”

Longerman looked to his left to make sure no one was coming, then checked the right, giving Bennings a quick glance of their origins: Mass General. Bennings heart sank. He knew the visit could only mean one thing – they were preparing to cut the Senator open, and Bennings would soon be evicted from his home.

Dr. Bennings frantically searched the supply room until he found a bin labeled “Adhesive sealant.” In the retraction dock, Bennings climbed onto of the pill, the bottle of sealant held between his teeth. He tore off the cap of the black sealant and squeezed it on the pill to write his message. When he was finished, he rushed to the helm, taking the ship from the medial canthus to the esophagus. When he finally reached the long, cavernous tunnel, he slowed the ship’s ascent. He knew how careful must be. If he stayed too low, the gag reflex may not be strong enough, but too high, and he would surely be expelled with the pill.

Dr. Bennings halted the ship as soon as he could see the top of the epiglottis. He pressed a series of commands on the control panel. The ship’s claw lowered from the hull, holding the pill in its bulky steel pincers. He aimed the ship upwards, so the nose was pointed at the top of Longerman’s throat. Bennings gently guided the ship towards the back of the throat, steering with one hand, while holding the other just above the claw release trigger. He knew the release needed to be timed perfectly to the reflex.

Bennings inched closer to the epiglottis. He took a deep breath. He pushed hard against the steering wheel. The ship collided with the epiglottis. Dr. Bennings jerked forward so harshly he felt his chest harness might snap. The gag reflex came instantaneously. Dr. Bennings pulled the claw release trigger. The pill detached from the ship and Bennings pulled back on the steering wheel as hard as he could, dropping down into the throat so quickly he felt like he was in free-fall. Through the cockpit window, he could see the pill floating above him. The ship dropped further down into the throat, while the pill was pulled away in the opposite direction. Dr. Bennings could just make out his message before it disappeared. It was sloppy, yet legible:

BENNINGS STAY OR ELSE

The next few days were suspiciously quiet. No messages were delivered and periodic trips to the eye showed that Longerman hadn’t gone back to the hospital. Eventually, Bennings was able to relax, confident that his message had been received and understood.

After breakfast, Bennings went to the helm to check the vitals. A message in ominous, dark red stated: “Oxygen levels – 3.6%”

Dr. Bennings regarding the message with quiet indifference. His research in the lungs had reached its successful conclusion, and he was now confident in his capabilities to syphon air from Senator Longerman’s lungs, meaning that he could now stay as long as he liked. And Bennings liked it just fine. He flew to the stomach to retrieve his meals for the day. He took his time, enjoying his instant coffee without a care in the world.

When Bennings reached the stomach and saw that it was once again empty, he wasn’t so much concerned as he was frustrated. In his mind, he had been a model tenant. He was clean and quiet and every day, for the past 78 days, he’d scooped bag after bag of plaque out of Longerman’s arteries, adding, by his calculations, years to the Senator’s life.

“And this is the thanks I get?” Bennings said aloud as he flew the ship above the vacant gastro-juices, searching for a morsel of food.

Bennings traveled back to the medial canthus to see what was causing his breakfast’s delay.

“You fool,” he said, crouched down, gripping the medial canthus without restraint. “You ungrateful fool.”

Before him, Longerman sat at his desk in his study, concluding a video call with his doctor.

“You’ve nothing to worry about,” the doctor said. “The procedure will over before you know it. See you soon.”

The call ended. Longerman shut off his computer.

Dr. Bennings had always taken extreme care while navigating Longerman’s body, but now, he flew the ship with impunity, bumping up against muscle and bone and ducts and joints and cartilage and interstitium. He hovered above the implanted artery valve and flipped the claw release trigger, emptying two and a half months’ worth of collected plaque.

Bennings parked the ship and trudged over to the mountain of garbage bags. He lifted the valve, tore open the nearest bag, and proceeded to dump the congealed plaque back into the artery.

“I devoted my entire career to developing this shrinking technology,” Dr. Bennings said, watching the hard, singular lump get taken away by the tide of the artery. “You could never begin to comprehend how much work and dedication it took to get here,” Bennings said as he tore open another bag.

“We should have just left that bomb inside your chest cavity.”

He started to sweat as he emptied bag after bag.

“The scientific breakthrough of the millennium was wasted on you. For Christ’s sake, you’re just a state senator!”

Bennings reached for another bag of plaque but saw there were none left. His heavy breathing fogged up his helmet. It was quiet and still inside the Senator.

Dr. Bennings collected the emptied bags. He walked back to his ship, confident that his point had been made.

The second he stepped out of the decompression chamber, the ship started to shake. Every alarm and light within the ship rang and strobed violently as the ship rumbled. This wasn’t a stubbed toe or a sneezing fit. Something was seriously wrong.

Bennings gunned it to the eye, pushing the ship to its max speed while the shaking only intensified. When he finally reached the medial canthus, the shaking had subsided. He looked out and saw that Senator Longerman was lying on the floor of his study. Before him was an overturned desk chair. Beyond that was a heap of shattered glass. Dr. Bennings removed the binoculars from his suit’s belt compartment. He looked out and saw it was the ship in the bottle. The completed Dutch schooner model sat atop a sea of jagged glass. It had somehow stayed intact after the fall.

Dr. Bennings cursed himself. His warning had gone too far. Instead of giving Longerman a jolt of chest pains, he had induced a full-blown heart attack. The eyelid came down, quick, yet gently, the inner wall just a few feet away from Dr. Bennings. It rose, then closed again, slower this time.

Dr. Bennings knew he didn’t have much time. His home was dying.

He raced back to the cavernous sinus where the ship was docked, engine still running. He lifted off and flew towards the eye, awkwardly bumping into the sclera. He felt no reaction from Longerman. The pain he’d just experienced, Bennings concluded, was far greater than any dot-sized irritation on the eye.

He came across the curved horizon and saw daylight. The lid suddenly closed, and Bennings slammed on the breaks. As he waited for them to reopen, he lamented that he was robbed the opportunity to say goodbye to his home, the best home he ever had, the only place where he truly felt at peace.

Benning’s heart raced as he waited for the lid to reopen. He wondered if he could even survive on the outside. The prospect of facing the big, wide-open, endless world filled him with a dense anxiety. Agoraphobia perhaps? But Bennings felt it was disrespectful to put a singular diagnosis on his fears. In his mind, this went beyond traditional phobia.

The lid slowly rose and Bennings pressed on the throttle. The ship soared towards the light. But just as he broke free of the eye socket, an instant darkness enveloped him. Bennings, hovering just outside of Longerman, strained to see what was before him.

It was Rosco. The loyal bullmastiff sniffed at Longerman’s face. It whimpered helplessly; heartbroken it could not help its master.

The dog leaned in and licked at Longerman’s face, dragging its tongue from the base of his left jaw, across the cheek, over the nose, onto the right eye.

The ship was abducted by the rapid pink wave.

Then darkness.

Dr. Bennings examined four distinct lumps of masticated food on his steel lab worktable. There was a wispy green lump, a condensed red lump, a jagged white lump, and a porous dark brown lump.

“Hmm,” he said, closely inspecting each piece. “Grass, chew toy, heartworm medication, kibble.”

While he was desperate for vegetation of any sort, Dr. Bennings refused to cut off a piece of the grass lump for his lunch. Looks like kibble again, he told himself.

It had been nearly two weeks since Bennings had settled in Rosco’s heart, and he felt like he was just now starting to feel at home.

“Funny,” he said aloud to no one, sitting at the empty kitchenette table, “I always fancied myself a cat-person."