Shadows | A Forever Fan-Fiction - Sequel to Lights

Chapter Thirty: Genome

At the end of the second day, we received all of the data. One day until Adam's attack.

"I'm going out to get some breakfast," Dr. Morgan called from the shop as I paced in his laboratory. "Do you want anything?" His voice echoed softly, before being lost to the screaming silence of my thoughts.

"I'll have a couple of hashbrowns," I replied carefully after a long pause.

"Okay, I'll be back in a bit." There were a few creaking thuds as he left the shop. I was alone. Abe was probably out reestablishing connections with other furniture dealers. Silence cast its hazy veil over the shop once more.

I pinned up parts of the results of the DNA tests on a chalkboard and stepped back to examine them once more, my mind swirling, shifting, moving. I reached forwards and examined the DNA one more time. There was no doubt about it. Dr. Morgan and Adam shared three sets of irregular genes, and I shared one set with them. It was almost nothing, compared to all of the genes in the human body, but it was still something. I had probably inherited several mutated genes from my mother, but since my father wasn't infected, I hadn't inherited the whole package of 'immortality.' The random person, who happened to be Lucas, since he'd volunteered his help, had no matching sets. I had also swabbed the inside of Dr. Morgan's mouth. Sure enough, there were trace amounts of unidentified organisms living inside of his bloodstream, in his body.

His lack of mortality was caused by a parasite. It leeched off of him and, in turn, mutated his cells so that they would await oxygen deprivation. The blood-deprived cells would combust, thus emitting a signal to the parasites to gather strands of DNA and search for a source of water that was also infected. Since most of the human body is made of or with water, that would assist greatly in regenerating the body. The simple fact that the cells responded only to an unnatural death, rather than a death from old age of wear and tear, was incredible. The parasites then sacrificed a handful of their lives to replace the cells that died naturally. Really, they were better than stem cells.

Or perhaps they edited the DNA? Changing the nucleotides and rearranging RNA patterns until cell replication and functions started to increase, saving a genetic copy of you as you were when you were infected and reproducing the parts of it that wore down?

But how did Dr. Morgan contract it? How did Adam contract it? How did my mother contract it? How had so few people contracted it? How was it spread? How could we produce an antidote? And how come I wasn't infected, if the parasites had infiltrated the bloodstream? How come I hadn't contracted it when I was a fetus?

"Damn it," I mumbled as my phone started buzzing, snapping me out of my thoughts. It was Duvall. Again. That man... I shook my head. He didn't know when to stop.

I turned away from the chalkboard, pieces of plans and ideas being constructed in my mind. Perhaps if we extracted enough of the parasites, we could infect another subject? Get more results? Gah, this was turning into a full-blown medical research project, and we didn't have the funds nor the time for that.

I collapsed into a chair, sighing heavi-

That was the solution.

My head snapped up.

If I could find a way to remove the parasites, and not kill the human cells, then maybe there wouldn't be enough parasites to regenerate the whole body. If I could get portions of skin, blood samples, and thin coffee straws, then perhaps I could emulate blood flow and kill the parasites with poison.

Footsteps, upstairs. He was back. I grimly turned back towards the staircase, my hands stuffed into my pockets.

"I got four hashbrowns for you, since you haven't eaten in-" He broke off, seeing the look on my face. He paused, glancing at the chalkboard, and then at me, his mouth slightly agape with the remains of his sentence dying in his mouth. "I've missed something, haven't I?"

"Um, yeah," I replied. "I think it's best that you sit down." I stood up and began pacing as he took a seat on a leather-padded stool. I spun around to face him, my eyes icy and my throat raw. "I figured it out."

He stared at me for a long time in a silence. "Lights-"

"We, together, have determined that your current state of timelessness is caused by a parasite that regenerates your cells very quickly. We've figured out that the parasites cause a permanent genetic mutation. We just couldn't figure out a way to... cure someone." I paused, turning away for a moment and sighing.

"Go on...?"

"I'm very sorry," I choked out, pain welling up as burning, melting tears behind my sagging eyelids. "I'm so sorry."

"Why? What's wrong? What's happened?" he demanded, shooting to his feet and moving to help me.

"No, no," I rushed. "Let me finish. I'm fine, just give me a moment. Sit back down."

He glanced at me with piercing concern before falling back onto the stool.

I inhaled deeply, turning my back to him as I blinked back tears. What I was going to ask of him was equivalent of betrayal. I turned back towards him after a recollected myself. "There isn't... I don't think that there's a viable cure. But there is a way to- to mercy-kill, if you will," I stated, trying to project an aura of stone-faceted indifference. "I think that there's a type of poison out there that, if used in the right dose and proportion, can eliminate the parasites without killing the human body in a method similar to chemotherapy. It would leave the victim, weak, paralysed with immense pain, but... it could work. It could stop the parasites from regenerating your body so quickly, it could stop the parasite from using your DNA to recreate their habitat once your cells have combusted."

His lips parted, but no sound came out. He suddenly understood what I was asking of him.

"I'm sorry." My voice, a threadbare whisper. Crystalline tears finally falling, like tiny glass orbs that shattered into a thousand glimmering molecules on the carpet.

"Tell me what to do," he said, his mouth barely moving.

-=+=-

Twenty-eight hours and forty-seven Petri dishes of falsified veins later, we found the right poison. An almost minuscule dose of a poison extracted from misletoe.

"You figured it out?" Dr. Morgan murmured drowsily as I wrapped a bandage around the spot where I had been mercilessly draining blood from his body. "It worked?"

"Yeah," I mumbled unhappily.

"Thank you," he sighed, closing his eyes once more and leaning back in his chair.

"Don't say that," I replied quietly, sitting down an empty table. "I didn't do anything. It's called luck."

"What's wrong? You just discovered the answer!" His eyes flashed, his jaw clenching and his hands tightening around the arms of his chair. He let out a quiet gasp of pain as the anaesthesia began to drain out of his system.

"I had to injure you to do so," I pointed out quietly as I tore off the surgical gloves and set them in a plastic bag, turning the the old-fashioned sink on and allowing the icy water to run through my fingers like rain washing through a grate.

"Everything has a cost. All that matters is that you succeeded."

"I suppose you're right." I sighed. "I'll prepare a few syringes of this poison, then. I can estimate Adam's height and weight."

He grabbed my hand fiercely, his eyes blazing with righteousness. "You did the right thing. Nothing great is without sacrifice, and if it means ridding this world of Adam, then..."

I nodded, tears pressing at my eyes. "I can free my mother, too, then. Perhaps it would be mercy, to release her from her confines, from her insanity. Perhaps she can meet whatever life comes after death."

His gaze softened. "Perhaps."

"Thank you, Doctor Morgan."

He smiled grimly. "We aren't done yet."

"No," I agreed, my voice laden with pain. "We aren't." Silence. The sound of the door opening, the bells jingling, and Abe walking back into the shop, announcing his arrival with a loud, cheerful greeting. Thoughts collecting like rainwater in the gutter. Nothing more.

-=+=-