D O U B L E T R O U B L E
(When one is not enough ...)
© August 2016 Written by David Wicker
Please do not reprint without permission
CHAPTER 7 - "Command Performance"
* * *
This chapter is Rated: EVERYONE
I
awoke to hear someone using a security card to open my door. The door slid back with a loud click. I raised up in bed in an instant.
It was Margot.
"Good morning !" she said with a friendly enough smile.
I saw she had brought a carry case so I wondered if I was going to get treated to a nice breakfast in bed.
She came near me. Set a plate on the bed. Then she pulled a few items from the case. A jar of yellow liquid and a -gulp- needle ! I was speechless as she put the needle at the top of the jar which had a rubber seal and extracted a minute portion.
"Give me your arm." she said all business like.
"I don't like needles !" I told her emphatically.
"Few of us do." she muttered.
She set the needle down and reached back in the case. This time she pulled out a white unmarked plastic bottle. She set it on the tray and opened it.
Inside were little yellow pills.
"I don't like pills either." I said, hoping I could avoid both.
Margot was not so agreeable. "It's the needle or the pill. Which will it be ?"
"Not my arm !" I said and buried my arms under the covers.
She tilted her head slightly and saw my pile of clothes on the floor. "Doesn't have to be the arm." she said and gave me a wicked smile.
I knew full well what she was thinking ! She wanted to jab that needle in my bare butt !
Well I wouldn't give her that pleasure. "I'll take the pill." I told her to avoid any unnecessary embarrassment or pain from the needle.
"Thattaboy." she said. She went to the sink and got a glass of water. Then handed me both.
I held the glass in my left hand and pill in my right not really wanting to do this either.
"Down the hatch." she said after a momentary pause.
I nodded. Took the pill and water, swallowed both.
"Open your mouth." she said.
"What ?" I asked.
"Open your mouth, I need to make sure you swallowed it."
I shrugged and showed her. I really did swallow it.
"Good boy." she said and put away the stuff on the tray.
"How about some breakfast ?" I asked her.
She shook her head. "No. No meals until later. We need that pill to work on an empty stomach."
"What does it do ?" I asked her.
She looked right at me but hesitated before telling me. "It - ahh - makes you more agreeable - less trouble."
"Do you expect any problems ?" I asked.
She sighed and turned it back around. "No, do you ?"
"No."
She got off the side of the bed. "Then get dressed. No time for a shower. I'll be outside waiting. Just knock on the door. And scoot. We don't want to dawdle."
She then went out the door and stood with her back to the side.
I watched her carefully as I got out of bed naked and put on my clothes. She never turned around. I washed my face a little then knocked on the door.
"Fine." she said. I recognized the wheelchair from before. "All aboard."
I got on. "By the way, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that your one change of clothes won't do. When we get back, you'll have a new uniform, just like the guys you saw earlier in the cafeteria."
I nodded without replying.
She wheeled on.
Finally we got to this very large security door. She used her card AND typed in a code AND scanned all five of her fingers !
Wow, tight security. The door opened with a resonating and definitely metallic THUMP. It had to have been 4-feet thick ! Then we went through on a special metallic ramp that cleared the opening. The door slowly closed behind me making a soft beeping sound to alert anyone nearby might get hurt if it closed on them.
She wheeled me to a type of indoor amphitheater. There was an operating table. I bolted in my seat but Margot was ready for me.
"Hey, ease up." she said trying to quell my fears. "They just want you lying down when you do your thing."
"Why ?" I asked her.
She sighed. Clearly I had asked more questions of her than all the clients combined. Well, I =DID= want to know what was going to happen to me !
"Look up there." and she pointed to the low ceiling. I saw the same chandelier that was above my bed.
"There's a camera up there. It will be recording everything. And by you lying down the team here can have a better look at what you are doing."
We arrived. She stopped the wheelchair, I got up, or THOUGHT I did ! Suddenly my balance gave out and I felt like I was walking in water.
"Easy !" Margot said, once again ready. "That's just the pill. You should feel very comfortable soon."
"Soon." I said numbly. My eyes dilated and I saw sparkles behind my eyes. It was as if there was a delicious trickle of cinnamon and sugar that was pouring into my brain. I licked my lips at the heavenly flavor.
Then someone wearing a surgical mask shone a pen-light in my eyes. He laughed although muffled, "Yeah, he's ready. Kid apparently has never had any drug like that before."
"It should be suitable." Margot said evenly. Then she left. I was sitting on the floor when two people in masks came to me. "Okay, we need you on the table. Here, let me help you."
And they lifted me up. As I was raised I felt like I was traveling through stars. I wasn't going up. The universe was going down. Down. D-o-w-n.
"It's going down." I said to no-one in particular.
"Sure you are." I heard as a reply. Then I was on the table. If I thought I was strapped in for Dr. Cadaver, that was nothing compared to this.
They bolted down my feet and ankles, legs, torso, chest, shoulders, arms, hands, neck, and even my head ! Strong metal restraints prevented from even moving my head a micron.
Then they slathered some slick and sticky stuff like Vaseline on my forehead and chest and attached monitoring cables to it.
"Client is secure and recording has begun." I heard a strong voice speak, apparently the leader of this strange team.
"Let's begin." I heard a voice over a speaker.
Someone came to address me. "David." I didn't respond.
"David. David. David, I'm Dr. Coppell, can you hear me ? David ?" I merely stared ahead. He tapped my face. No reaction. Then he slapped it, but gently. Also no reaction.
"We've got a zombie here." he complained to the voice.
"Give him 100cc's of Stokaline." the bodiless voice said.
"That much ?"
* * *
"Yes."
If I didn't like needles, I didn't care right now. He rolled up my short-sleeve and gave me a hard injection right at the top if the shoulder.
Then everyone just sat still for about a minute. Finally he came back over.
"David ?"
"Yes ?" I said. I still felt dreamy but not to the point of being totally unaware as I was earlier.
"I'm Dr. Coppell. We want to test your ability to - to duplicate items. I promise we won't hurt you. What we find out here could be of great benefit to the scientific community and quite possibly the government."
"Okay." I said simply.
"Fine." He then rolled over a cart with three trays. One was a banana, the other, some piece of jewelry, and the other a live turtle.
"Let's start with the banana." he placed it in my hand. Then they rolled a small tray near my wrist. "Make the duplicate on this tray."
I nodded. I thought of the banana, it's size, shape, weight, texture, age, taste, and mellowness. Then very quietly as I was pretty drugged out said in a whisper, "You're mine."
A new banana appeared on the tray. Then everyone in the room was suddenly abuzz with talking, surprise, and amazement. Apparently it was only a rumor I could do what I did. Now they knew for certain it was a fact.
One of the other scientists came close. He put on some thick gloves. Then he picked up the duplicate banana. It was clear he was very frightened that something bad would happen by the way he held it away from himself.
He rolled it around in his grip for a moment. Being satisfied it wasn't going to explode, he then peeled back a bit of the skin. It smelled wonderful and fresh.
He was just getting ready to lift his mask and take a bite when the bodiless voice spoke. "No ! You'll corrupt it. Place it on the analysis tray. Let's see if it's genuine."
He did so. Then he hit some switches nearby and differently colored lights and lasers shone over the banana. On the screen a green grid representation of the banana appeared. To the side were words - I couldn't see what they were from where I was.
But there were several visual meters, about 16 of them. And they started with yellow text at 0% and rapidly started to rise. Some hit 100% and turned green. Finally after a minute, they all turned green and a satisfactory beep was heard.
"Real banana." Dr. Coppell said, a bit surprised himself.
"Go to the next test." the voice from above said.
Dr. Coppell took the banana from my grip and put the piece of jewelry in my hand. I felt around it. It was cold and hard and likely valuable.
"Jewelry. Go on, David." he urged me.
I thought about it. Diamonds I told myself. It's all diamonds. Very valuable. Heavy, sparkly, shining in the light. Cold. Beautiful. But what are diamonds ? Are they hard rocks that come from Antarctica ?"
Satisfied I thought all I could about them I whispered, "You're mine." and as with the banana, a duplicate appeared.
Dr. Coppell was being a bit more excited than safe and leapt over to pick up the duplicate, but suddenly he set it down immediately and gripped his gloved hand in pain.
"What is it ?" the voice asked. "What happened ?"
"I'm okay." he said to reassure everyone. "I'm sure it's a good duplicate, it's just very cold for some reason. Arctic."
"Ice." I said.
Dr. Coppell laughed then came close to me. "Is it a joke David, another name for diamonds ?"
I didn't really know so I shrugged but replied, "Sorry."
He put an assuring gloved hand on my face. "Hey ! Don't you worry, you're doing great. Better than great, you're awesome ! You hear me. You just keep it up. We'll finish soon and let you back to your room."
"Breakfast." I said. Apparently the drug I was on somehow determined single words were complete sentences to me.
"Yeah, breakfast, we'll bring you some."
And if my mind wasn't so fuzzy I would wonder why I couldn't go to the cafeteria to get my own breakfast. But I was still feeling good and sleepy so I didn't speak beyond that.
Dr. Coppell put on a different set of gloves and picked up the 'ice' to put it on the scanner.
One of the visual meters registered temperature and it was 100 degrees below zero ! Other items started to appear and yellow permeated the screen. It was not an exact copy. According to the machine it was glass, not diamonds. The rest of the jewelry was nickel so apparently that did transfer despite the temperature difference.
"What is this ?" the voice demanded, apparently upset at being robbed the ability to freely create real diamonds.
Dr. Coppell defended me and said, "Wait. I think it's because he doesn't know what diamonds really are. He is only 10-years old after all."
"We'll have to work on this." the voice said. "Continue to the last test."
Dr. Coppell picked up the small live turtle and put it near my hand.
"No." I said. I didn't want to do this.
"What's wrong ?" the voice said, sounding more than a little irritated now.
Dr. Coppell put his hand in mine to comfort me. "Hey, it's okay David. What's wrong ?"
"I've never duplicated life before. What if I get it wrong ?"
He rubbed my palm through his gloves. "It's okay. We need to know this, and I think in truth you would like to know too. Don't worry. If - something goes wrong, we're ready for it. This is a safe place. You are safe here. No worries."
I nodded. So then I thought about the turtle as well as I could. Not very heavy, squiggly as he was moving his feet around my fingers. Had a bit of a smell, the shape, the size, and ... I couldn't think of anything else.
Life ? I told myself. I don't - I don't know how to do life. But you've got to try, another voice within me spoke.
It's alive. I told myself. It's alive, it's a beautiful creature. They make great pets. I can even imagine a cage to keep him in. I mean, I mean, they look like dragons don't they ? Are turtles a type of dragon ? Dinosaurs ! Great snapping, oh the pain if you got bit by a snapping turtle !
Sweat started to bead on my head as my brain furiously tried to think of anything and everything to do with turtles. Dr. Coppell quickly mopped up the moisture on my forehead.
Then he spoke both to me and the voice, "I think this is going to be amazing !" and held a thumb up for encouragement.
Then, with nothing more to think of, having thought of everything I could, I spoke in a scary whisper, "You're mine."
A duplicate turtle did not suddenly appear though. No, it was if the air around suddenly grew stale, and then whipped with tremendous speed to where the duplicate was supposed to appear.
Bright weird lights shone and strange faces of all kinds of creatures tore through the air on the tray, but still no turtle. Then you could see a turtle's green shell, but it was like it was bursting from an odd luminescent flower, as if turtle shells blossomed from common plants.
Suddenly incredible heat started to burn and melt the tray around it in a white hot fire.
"I think this is going to be bad !" Dr. Coppell said fearfully, changing his views. Then to me in a terrified voice, "David. Can you hear me. David ! Don't do it. Stop. We're done. We're done. WE'RE DONE !!"
"Go away." I said simply to the bizarre thing that tried to pull itself up on the tray.
The weird luminous superheated green mass with razor teeth shrieked in an unearthly wail that everyone could hear - and then started to retreat, as if the very air around it was burning it to nothing.
There was a bright flash of violet-blue light, a loud pop, and the only thing that remained were the melted edges of the steel tray and a black burn mark scorching the center.
Fortunately the original turtle was unharmed.
Dr. Coppell looked up and started to speak at once to the voice. "Look sir, I'm sorry, I apologize, I was way out of line when I - I mean, I had no idea this, that is, we can't possibly - we need stronger safeguards - it won't happen again, I promise that - "
He continued to babble on but you could easily hear the voice's cackling laughter getting louder and louder until it drowned out Dr. Coppell's apologetic rant.
Dr. Coppell looked around, stunned that there would be anything remotely humorous to the earlier ghastly and terrifying display.
Then there was silence. It was if the voice was daring anyone to speak so he could bite their head off, but no-one did. Then the voice sighed with pleasure and reverberated over the speakers in a slow comfortable voice full of appreciation. "Beautiful weapon."
"Wuh - Weapon ?" Dr. Coppell repeated in confusion.
The voice was now ecstatic with dreams of power, "Didn't you see it man !? A great and powerful weapon, years beyond our science ! If this effect be harnessed, controlled, mastered, we can USE the boy - " and then suddenly he got quiet.
The voice changed pitch slightly and it was if he was addressing a bunch of children now. "But don't you worry about it. Any of you. I'll take care of it from here. Yes, that is good. For now we are done."
The voice got quieter and magnanimous, "Give the boy a good breakfast if that's what he wants. But under NO CIRCUMSTANCES is he to mingle with any of the others, he is to be confined to his room. See to it !"
Then there was a resounding click, clearly the speaker from the ceiling turning off, and then strangely all the lights went out too.
(to be continued ...)
END OF CHAPTER 7
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