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Authors: kevin caruso

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BOOK: Sparks of Chaos
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“Chase, Chase, are you listening to me?”

 “What, yeah sure I am,” he answered startled.

“Mr. Riley, I think that’s enough for now, I’ll be in contact with you and we’ll continue this,” Armstrong said as he switched off the video monitor and the wall returned to normal.

Chapter 11

In his private office, Rex surreptitiously watched the interaction between Chase and Armstrong. While he completely trusted both Armstrong and Tedford, he had created them after all; it never hurt to make sure. Once created, the BLI were independently thinking beings, he had made them that way. So taking a cue from his favorite President, Ronald Reagan, it was always wise to trust but verify. The conversation showed he had no reason to worry, it was just a small nagging feeling he had been getting.

It was strange in a way to hear of himself spoken that way to the boy. He hadn’t really thought about that part of his life for some time now, preferring to focus on the important tasks at hand. He had to admit though, that stage had been infinitely better than his younger years. His time as a child and well into adulthood were almost too painful to remember. It was the first time in many, many years that he had allowed himself to pick at that particular mental scab.

Even though he had earned two Ph.D. degrees by the time he was twenty five, eventually made one of the greatest scientific discoveries of all time and created a multi-billion dollar business empire, he was still in some ways that little boy that everyone tormented. Rex King, yes that was how he thought of himself now, the persona he had created for himself but inside, some part of him would always remain Wayne Stubbard. Oh how he had hated his name. That wasn’t the worst of it of course, children could be unbelievably cruel and they called him many names. Stubby Stubbard was one but the worst was Wayne the Stain. It was the cruelest and therefore the most popular due to the unfortunate wine-red birthmark that crept up the right side of his neck and past the ear and onto his face.

To top it all off, he was physically unimpressive with no ability at sports and amazingly socially awkward. These were not great attributes to possess as a child anywhere but they were particularly unappreciated growing up in Eastern Tennessee. He had always been smart, let’s face it he was brilliant, but somehow never smart enough to figure out he shouldn’t make sure everyone knew it and to rub their faces in it. His younger brother was only a so-so student but an incredible athlete, tall, good looking with wavy golden blonde hair and popular with everyone.

In a standard story their differences would drive them apart and make them sibling enemies. However nothing was further from the truth, he and his brother had always been great friends. His brother Edward though younger by almost two years had stood up for him, making sure he was included and helped minimize the hazing and beatings he sometimes endured. He had done his best to help repay him by allowing him to help run his business empire and thus making him rich in the process. He had never shared his discovery with his brother though, or with anyone.

Things hadn’t really improved much for him as he’d gotten older. His hair had been a rather unremarkable mousy brown and had begun thinning until he was almost completely bald before he had turned thirty. At five foot seven with a noticeable paunch on a slight frame accented with the pale skin that came from spending too much of his life inside a laboratory, he naturally wasn’t a big hit with the ladies. On the few occasions that he’d actually spent with a female, his often abrasive personality had managed to drive away even those who had looked past his physical shortcomings, except for Betsy and Marla, there had been no one of any consequence. He would never forget Marla and never ever forgive Steven. Eventually he had just got used to being alone and he liked it, or at least he had done a pretty good job convincing himself that he had.

Running his hands through his robotically engineered thick lustrous black hair, Rex smiled to himself that those days were long gone and there was little he missed about them. Once he collected enough money from his sales of gold and gems, things started to get much better. It took a few years to bring his plans to fruition; sure he could have accelerated the results either by taking chances or even through theft. He was notoriously cautious but it had paid off by never raising suspicions as to how his fortune began. He had also made a conscious decision to never use his discovery to harm others; it was also why regardless of what he’d said, he knew he couldn’t kill that boy. 

There really were a lot of advantages to having incredible wealth. He was able to buy the best researchers and technologies possible. Eventually he assembled the most effective research lab in the world. Acquiring key companies at the optimum time enabled him to assemble a business empire that was one of the most essential defense contractors. As a top contractor he had influence and access to the highest levels of the US government. The technology advances he provided to them made him indispensable and gave him access to all kinds of top secret classified programs. Not being constrained by financial concerns as other companies were, allowed him to use these resources and information for his own personal projects.

Startled out of his memories, he focused in to watch Armstrong sign off and prematurely end Chase’s orientation session. After that, he wondered if they were having second thoughts about the boy now too.    

Chapter 12

Armstrong turned toward Tedford, sighed and said, “I think it may be more effective if I take a more direct tactic with this young man.”

“What are you planning to do?”

“I am going to sit with him in person now to prepare him for his new life.”

“Do you think that’s wise or safe, we still don’t know much about this boy.” Tedford stated.

Chortling he answered “There’s no risk involved, he can’t harm us in anyway and he can’t escape. There is nowhere for him to go. A hands-on approach should yield us better results.”

“Are you really sure that we are doing the right thing using this boy? I know what our calculations say but what if Rex is correct and we ruin that? I have my doubts this boy will be able to play the part we need him to,” Tedford wondered out loud.

“Remember we are doing this for Rex not to him and I am sure this boy is exactly what we needed, in many ways he is our only hope,” Armstrong answered. “I am heading back to finish his session but I’m still not sure how he’s going to react to seeing the island when we let him out of his room.” Armstrong turned and walked out to go and face Chase in person.

In his room, Chase saw the lights flash and heard the bong sound before a door seemed to almost magically appear in the wall. Walking in through the opening was the same old guy from the video wall. He was surprisingly shorter than Chase. He had expected him to be bigger after seeing him on the wall video. It had not been that long since he had ended their call and Chase had not had much chance to sit and reflect on their conversation but he had a vague suspicion that he had somehow failed a test of some kind.

Dressed in his standard formal black suit, Armstrong gestured with his right hand and asked Chase to sit on the same couch he had sat on during their call. “It is my pleasure to meet you in person. We have much to discuss, and I hope you are ready now?”

“Yes, BLI I am ready and glad to meet you in person as well,” he answered.

“Just so you are aware, my name is Armstrong, BLI is more of a title, something like Mister” he explained.

“Okay Armstrong, when am I getting out of here and going home to see my family?” Chase asked. “My parents are going to be freaking out by now and I need to let them know I’m alright. My father is going to kill me over all of this.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll get to all of that. I believe I told you that we needed to cover some background information if you were ever going to be able to understand the situation we have here,” he explained while deliberately not looking him in the eyes.

Chase was worried though, he was observant enough to notice that the older man had not actually answered his question. He would need to keep his wits about him and see if maybe there was some way to escape from here. Probably made sense to wait for now, he didn’t really have enough information yet to even know where to begin.  He was strong enough now that they had fixed him, to overpower that old dude. He was still locked in here with no way out and he had no idea who or what was on the other side of that magic door that he couldn’t open anyways. Yeah, it made sense to wait for the right opportunity, plus he didn’t want them using that freaky ray or whatever it was they demonstrated on the bread.

“I think it best if maybe I focus upon the important points rather than explaining everything in detail now.”

“Sure, sounds like a great plan, I am ready to get started,” Chase said eagerly.

“Alright, well to continue, Mr. King used his new fortune and his scientific genius to come up with a way that he felt could best use his discovery without allowing the world to know about it and experience the terrible effects we discussed. One of his greatest fears was that he would one day become ill or die and either the discovery would be lost or that it would fall into the wrong hands. He began working in earnest on ways to strengthen his body and extend his lifespan, succeeding beyond anything he could have imagined. I won’t try and bore you with all of the details as they are quite technical and require an advanced scientific background to fully grasp their significance but I will explain what it means,” Armstrong told him.

When the boy didn’t interrupt him he continued, “He created biological biobots, and using his discovery was able to shrink them to a size that would require a powerful microscope to see them.  These are extremely potent little machines that when released directly into the body are programmed to attach themselves to the DNA and make changes and improvements. Do you understand what DNA is and why this is so important?”

“Sure we learned about it in school, it’s that double helix stuff with the chromosomes and genes that determine what you look like, right? Chase asked

“Well yes, it’s a lot more complex than that and they not only control your appearance but your health and all the other effects in your body. After rigorous experiments on test animals he tested them upon himself as the first human subject and succeeded. With this treatment, he was able to improve his health, appearance, arresting the aging process and was even successful in making his body self-healing.  For all intents he is now immortal,” Armstrong answered.

Looking at his body and seeing how it had miraculously been healed after his ordeal and quite frankly was even better than before, the implications of what Armstrong just told him hit home. “You did this treatment on me, didn’t you? Am I going to live forever?” He asked him with a stunned realization.

“Yes, we gave you the treatment. It only takes a very small amount, one or two teaspoons of liquid is enough to hold billions of biobots. We had no choice, you were practically dead, and if we waited even another minute it would have been too late.”

“Wow, I really am never going to die, that’s pretty cool,” Chase said as it all began to dawn on him.

Armstrong continued, “It is actually much, much more than that. There are many other implications to the treatment. You will never get sick; you will never get any older than you are now and all of your senses have been heightened. Your body won’t deteriorate over time; in fact it will get better. Your digestive system has been improved so that it more efficiently converts everything you consume; you can eat anything and as much as you want and your weight will never change. The food will taste even better and you will never again need to use the toilet.”

Chase sat stunned, it was really all too much to a take in at once. “What happens when my family starts to notice the differences in me? If I never go to the bathroom or get any older, not to mention the change in my appearance now?”

Armstrong just looked at him, without directly offering an answer. “I’m never going home am I?” Chase stated as the full implications finally became apparent to him. “This will destroy my parents, you can’t do this to my mother.”

“I am very sorry to tell you that you cannot return to your former life. We had no choice, it was this or death. Your family was going to lose you either way, at least now you get to live.”

“Live where exactly; all I’ve seen is this room I’ve been locked in. You’ve just told me I am going to live forever but that I can never go home. What’s going to happen to me?” Chase pleaded.

Shaking his gray haired head in frustration, Armstrong said “Alright, I had planned to take some time and explain all of this in-depth but I have changed my mind. I think now it may be best to just show you instead. I have to warn you though to brace yourself, there are a lot more shocks yet to come. You’ve got your wish, let’s go now follow me.”

Armstrong turned toward the wall and a small seam appeared and then a doorway opened and he walked through. “What are you waiting for? Let’s go.”

Chase peered through the suddenly appeared doorway to see what was on the other side.

“Have you changed your mind? Would you rather stay here now?” he asked knowing his answer.

“No I’m coming,” Chase said as he walked into a new life that he never chose for himself. Walking through the nondescript hallway he wondered what awaited him at the end.

Chapter 13

After only a few steps through the hallway, Armstrong gestured with his hand and a door opened. They stepped into what appeared to be an elevator.  After a very quick descent the door opened again and they both walked speedily through a nice building lobby that he had no time to appreciate as they stood before a door that led to the outside.

Following Armstrong through the doors, Chase found himself standing in a large sunlit plaza. He had seen it happen on TV before and always thought it was an exaggeration but his mouth actually did drop open with surprise. It was beautiful, it was futuristic, it was otherworldly and it was simply breathtaking.  The plaza had an extremely intricate design that sparkled like demented diamonds and was highlighted by artwork and statues. There was a copious amount of flowers, trees and greenery and while he wasn’t an expert they were clearly very oddly colored and shaped. It was the buildings though that completely stunned him.

BOOK: Sparks of Chaos
12.35Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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