Shakespeare Syndrome: Nothing To See Here, Ma'am

[x-jeangrey.livejournal.com]

Saturday morning, Jean and Jennie show up at the Green Speed factory for a surprise inspection.



It had taken a while to get through the company's bureaucracy to find someone actually useful to talk to, and they'd stuck her and Jennie in an office to wait until the factory manager could talk with them. It had been almost ten minutes when the door finally opened and Jean smiled at the man who stepped inside. "Mr. Roberts? I'm Dr. Jean Grey-Summers, this is my associate, Jennie Stavros, I'm glad you could meet with us. As I'm sure you've been told, we need to talk with you about some health concerns which have arisen about your product."

"Yes, Shasta told me that you were here but...concerns? I don't understand. Are you with the FDA?" He was a delicate looking man with a weak chin and a faded Tommy Bahamas shirt. His handshake was strong however and he looked genuinely interested in them. "Come into the office, it's a bit noisy in here." It wasn't really, the factory was fairly quiet, all things considered and almost bizarrely clean and cheerful. It looked more like an ad for an ideal work place than it did a working manufacturing facility.

"No, we're running an independent investigation into this recent outbreak..." She paused and smiled faintly, eyes hard. "I'm sorry, I don't know if you've been following the news with all of the rhyming and poetic truthfulness that's been going on? We believe we've discovered a link between an undocumented additive in a batch of your energy drink."

"Oh, I don't follow the news. It's all just lies and unpleasantness anyway. What's been going on exactly? I'm sure that it's just a mistake. Our safety and health standards are among the best in the industry." He waved them into chairs and hopped up onto the desk, leaning forward.

Jennie raised a dark eyebrow at the man. Either he was covering somthing up, or he really did live under a rock out in the middle of nowhere. "There has been a recent epidemic, with large numbers being recorded in the last week of people who have been forced to speak the truth. Literally forced, mind you," Jennie said, thinking of all the awkward moments of the past week. "What's even weirder, is that these people had to speak the truth in verse. You name it, there was rhyming couplets, iambic pentameter, and even one guy got stuck in Haiku. Surely you had to have noticed this?"

He blinked and sat up straight, "No, we didn't...well, that's not true. Madison spent a couple of days composing sonnets for everyone on the staff but we just thought that her therapy was going well. Are you saying she was somehow coerced? But how? I don't understand what this has to do with our products."

"Because it all came from your product. The green energy drink," Jennie said, nodding to a poster behind the man. "I had one after a dance class on Tuesday, and then interestingly enough, I wound up saying rather awkward and humiliating things in rhyme for the next two days. Several of my friends had the same thing happen to them, and the thing that we all had in common was that energy drink."

"Once the evidence started pointing to the Green Speed," Jean picked up the tale, "we did some lab analysis of the drink, from a can which had caused one of these rhyming outbursts. In addition to all the ingredients properly documented on the label it also contained a complex organic enzyme - non-harmful, thankfully, but potentially the cause of all this fuss. Which brings us to you. Since your company had nothing to do with this, I'm sure," Jean's tight smile indicated she maybe wasn't as sure of that as Roberts might like, "we'd like to know who all would have access to the drink before it was bottled, who might have been able to add this concoction."

"No one. We keep our facility entirely secure. You never know what sort of corporate sabotage traditional companies will try on someone doing something innovative." The man's pleasant face began to look a little mulish. "You must be mistaken. None of my employees would do anything to harm our customers and no one can tamper with any part of the process without being seen and reported."

There was no question - he firmly believed what he was saying. Whatever was going on here he, at least, was uninvolved. But Jean wasn't willing to put that much value on his faith in his employees. "I'm sure you're right," she said calmly. "Would you mind giving us a bit of a tour, though? So we can meet some of your employees and get an idea of what would and wouldn't be possible?"

"It's not that we don't believe you," said Jennie. It's just that we don't believe you. "But we'd like to cover all of our bases here. You know, I'm sure we're not going to find anything but just to be sure."

He pushed off the desk, frowning, "Well, we are happy to provide tours of the plant. I'm afraid I can't allow you to interrogate my staff but I'll certainly give you a walk around. Then I'm afraid you must leave."

"That will be fine," Jean assured him. After all, it wasn't as though she needed to interrogate anyone.