Shapeshifter - Luke Pontbriand (carter reed .TXT) 📗

I was aware from the moment I was first conscious, and I can remember every detail of my life. Every moment, every feeling is fresh in my memory as if it was yesterday. From the moment I was aware, I had so many questions about the world around me, so much wonder. Since then, many questions have been answered. These answers, in turn, have lead to new questions, as they always will. Discovery never ends. Discovery is what my entire short life has been about so far, discovery, and one more thing.
My first memory was coming awake in a glass tank. Green liquid swirled and bubbled around me. I was in a glass cylinder about five feet high and two feet in diameter. I could see outside into the rest of the Lab, instruments and monitors were jam-packed into the small room. Some people in white lab coats scurried about outside. I seemed to be the center of their attention.
My first feeling was desire. I wanted the world outside, the lab, I was tired of the tank already. A closer examination of the sides revealed nothing I could exploit, nothing but smooth glass. The top and bottom were covered with instruments and sensors, but I didn’t know their purpose, so I turned to the world outside.
I looked out from my prison into the lab. Many white-coats were taking notes on clipboards or watching instruments. Only one was actually watching me. I don’t know why, but something made me fear her. This person is dangerous, my inner voice told me. I turned to look at the other white-coats. I could hear them, I could see them, but I could smell and feel and taste only the tank and the liquid inside.
But sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell were not the only senses at my disposal. I could feel something else, just at the edge of my senses. I reached out and brought it into focus. Instantly I was overwhelmed by a barrage of new sensations. These are thoughts, I realized. I shut them out, there were too many to make sense of. I tried a new approach, I reached out with my 6th sense, this time focusing on only one of the white-coats. His eyes were glued to a monitor.
His brain activity is off the charts, the white-coat thought. I turned to another white-coat, testing my new ability, …Never seen anything like it, who designed this DNA? That was when I discovered something else. Not only could I hear their thoughts, I could understand them; words and phrases like ‘brain activity’, and ‘DNA’ made sense to me. Because the white-coats understood their own thoughts, I could draw understanding of their thoughts from their minds. It occurred to me that they might not always understand their own thoughts, and thus my ability to read them might be impaired.
I moved faster and faster, drawing thoughts from first one white-coat, and then another. Anything pertinent, I analyzed, anything else I stored away for later. Gradually my understanding of the tank grew. I moved to the bottom of the tank, looking at the instruments there. If I could pull some wires, the right wires, and cause a short circuit, the tank would drain itself and open.
The white-coats went into a panic after I pulled the first wire. I ignored them, focused intently on my task. As I pulled out more wires and began to reconnect them in different ways, I became aware of the fact that the white-coats were not shouting anymore. I glanced up to see that they were all watching me now. The one who had been watching me before-the dangerous one-had calmed them down. I went back to my task.
Sooner than I expected, I was rewarded with a sloshing sound as the green liquid drained away and the tank opened with a hiss. That was when I became aware of the concept of breathing.
I couldn’t breathe anymore, not without the green liquid. Some of the white-coats murmured anxiously, but the dangerous one quieted them. I need lungs, I thought, human lungs. No sooner had I thought this than I felt a bubbly tingling sensation deep in my chest. Things were changing, morphing. The feeling stopped. I inhaled deeply, breathing in the outside air. It felt so good.
The scientists were clapping for me. I smiled up at them, proud to have made them happy.
Someone brought a dog into the lab. Their thoughts were clear to me; they wanted me to change into it. Why not? I pet the dog, wondering if that was possible.
As soon as I touched it, pictures and numbers flew through my mind like leaves in a storm. Gradually they condensed into one thought, one image. I stood before a DNA molecule, a double helix. It was the dog’s DNA. This had all the information I needed. It told me exactly how the dog’s organ systems worked and how they were built. I can do this.
My features began to change, and it occurred to me that I hadn’t taken the time to examine myself. Would I be able to change back? By the time I had completed this thought, I was a dog. Two Rottweilers sat next to each other. One was me, the other one sniffed me curiously. Being a dog was different. My eyesight was worse than before, I could not see color. My nose was hundreds of time stronger. My ears were also more sensitive. I briefly enjoyed exploring the world with these new senses, but I quickly became tired. My features melted back into my own, and my world faded to black. Shifting takes a lot of energy.
The next time I woke, I had a room of my own. Maybe more like a closet, but it was an improvement on the tank. There was no door, but a green barrier of light covered it. Curious, I touched it, but I quickly jerked my hand back. The light burned and stung. My room was bare. There was a bed built into the left wall, which looked inviting if not fancy. There was the floor, the ceiling, the other walls, and a camera in the corner that had a complete view of the cell, bed and all. On the back wall, there was a drawer that said ‘Nutrition’ and a seat with a hole in it that said ‘Waste’. I opened the drawer.
Inside was a rectangular chunk of green stuff wrapped in plastic. I unwrapped it. I tasted it. It was good, chewy and filling. I ate it, all of it, and I tried to eat the plastic too, but I didn’t like it.
So instead of eating it, I studied it. Looked at it, turned it in my hands, crumpled and stretched it to hear its sound and feel its feel. Time passed. I began to make shapes with the plastic, folding it into a triangle, a circle, a square.
I heard a fizzing sound and turned to see the green light in the door disappear. The scientists stepped through. There were only three this time. Before there had been many. Front and center was the dangerous, smart one, the leader. She scared me. She was short, but her spirit was tall and imposing, her mind sharp and quick. She had brown hair and green eyes. To her left was a stupid one. He had a clipboard and was always taking notes. He took so many notes that he missed what he was taking notes about. The other two valued him because they could review his notes later. He was old. I could not read the mind of the one to her left. He was cold, tall, arrogant. He had pale skin and dark hair. He scared me more than her.
“My name is Matilda Black,” she said, “Do you understand me?”
I did. The meaning of her word was in her mind, clear as an open book. She was talking to me, trying to communicate, that made her mind more open. I said nothing.
“This is Dr. Smith,” she gestured to the tall one, “and this is Dr. Washington.” He was taking more notes. She waited for me to respond. I made her wait longer. I did not like Dr. Smith and Dr. Washington.
I made her wait, but she had patience, and I only had questions. Finally, I asked,
“What is my name?”
“You,” Dr. Smith said coldly, “are Subject 13 Alpha 001.”
That name was not like their names. It did not sound right. I did not like it.
“No I’m not.” I told him. This angered him. I was frightened.
“Yes you are!” He shouted, “You will not argue.”
I was scared, but I knew he was wrong. Subject 13 was not my name. I would not be called by it. Never. A fleeting thought jumped across Matilda’s mind, and I heard it. I grabbed onto it. This was my way out.
I looked into her eyes, “You wanted to call me Joshua Black, because I’m your…brainchild?” I asked.
She stared at me.
“I didn’t-I did-I,” she stammered.
“Compose yourself Dr. Black!” Dr. Smith ordered. Dr. Washington took more notes.
I had them, almost, just one more push.
“Didn’t you create me?” I asked her, “Shouldn’t you be the one to name me?”
The scientists started arguing, except Dr. Washington, he wrote so fast he broke his pencil. I watched him get another. He broke it again.
I tried to ignore the argument as best I could, but I still caught snatches of it.
“He’s too rebellious.” Dr. Smith insisted, “We mustn’t give in.”
“He’s independent, he’s learning, isn’t that what he was designed for?”
“He can’t be too independent.”
“You may be my senior, but this is my project. It will be run my way, not yours.”
There was silence. They had stopped fighting. I was huddled up tightly in a corner. The fight scared me. I hadn’t meant to make them fight, or had I? Something touched me, I looked up.
There was Matilda.
“Joshua.” She said, and that was all.
They left. The green light in my door came back. I had many thoughts to think now. “Joshua Black.”
I tasted the words on my tongue, pondered them. I am Joshua Black. Joshua Black is me. What does Joshua Black look like? I wondered. My hands. My skin was pink. My hands, smooth and small. I was smaller than the scientists. My hair, short and clean. Over my skin was a black jumpsuit. It fit perfectly. It was part of me, part of my skin. It covered my arms and my legs and my body. What was it for? The scientists didn’t have two pairs of skin. What color were my hair and eyes? The metal walls of my room were reflective. I looked into them, the image was blurry, but it was clear enough for my purposes. My hair was blond. My eyes blue.
I heard a short buzz. It was electric sounding. Where had it come from? There was nothing new in the lab that I could see from my room. I opened the ‘Nutrition’ drawer again. More green food was there. I ate it; I was still hungry from when I was a dog. I kept the plastic as before. I could make two shapes at once now.
I amused myself with this until Matilda came back. Dr. Washington was with her, but Dr Smith watched from the far end of the room. Dr. Washington brought a cardboard box. It was big and there was something heavy