Illumini

Chapter 1

PART ONE

 Chapter 1

In a dark laboratory, filled with testing equipment, a man sits nervously at a metal desk.  He is tall and angular, with strong features that reveal a determined nature.  The room is silent and still except for the steady sound of his heavy breathing, the only indication of the nervousness that grips him.  His intelligent eyes reflect digits that slash across a large, flat, neon screen.  Eyes that reveal an old soul, patient and wise, despite his youth, that see a cynical world possessed by the worst instincts of human nature.

His hands flow nimbly over a keyboard as he hacks the security code of a computer.  He is using a remote device to crack the password.  The screen fills with a racing column of data, rolling faster than he can read.  His heightened response is fluid and firm, as his thoughts race ahead, anticipating the next command.

His tense face is alight in the soft glow of the screen as the computer rapidly runs through the security check.  The room around him is awash with the eerie red glow of an exit sign, this dark florid light an apparition that flooded everything, the room, the hallway, the entire building.

As he types rapidly the skin on his right arm burns intensely, a virus has been surging through his veins for days now, just below the surface of his skin.  Crawling across every inch of his body, oozing pustules are bubbling up and spreading out.  He desires desperately to scratch his arm, but keeps his mind focused only on the task before him.

His senses are alive and on edge, waiting on a complacent world to move faster, to catch up.  As his mind races ahead of events, every fiber of his being is alert and on guard, feeling the world around him as he never has before.  This edgy feeling evidence of a sixth sense, something completely new and unexpected, which had grown within him.

The login screen suddenly accepts a string of digits.

He is in!

The antivirus program runs through its checks now, testing his last ounce of patience.

"Come on, come on!" his voice whispers in a hushed desperation.

The program completes.

"Finally!"

As the display fills with icons, he slides swiftly through several screens; selecting the app he is looking for with a soft touch of his finger.  The program loads and his attention is riveted on a blinking curser, persistently prompting him, from the depths of his darkness with a rhythmic pulse.  His mind goes blank.  He exhales in frustration; his hands rub his face as he searches his elusive memory for a string of digits.

"The number, the number," he says to himself. "What was that number?"

He quickly shuffles papers across his desk, finds the notepad and frantically flips through the pages.  His finger finally coming to rest beneath a long code half way down the crowded page.  He rapidly types in the microarray test number 295A9K5LR8.

Suddenly, the assay data begins to race across a dialog box, a blur of digits, spilling rapidly down the screen.  He stares in amazement.  Finally, what he's been searching for, answers to the many questions that have haunted him, making for very long, stressful, and uncertain days.

In the distance, he hears a voice, remote and inaudible, but it sets his heart racing.  Doors are opening and closing, getting louder.  He pulls out an Iomega drive, synchronizes the devices, and starts to copy the database to the external drive.

Voices, uttered now with authority, echo across the lab, the voices become louder and louder, constantly moving closer.  He stares helpless at the computer screen waiting, as the data continues to copy.  The progress bar on the screen seemingly stuck.  Panic grips him.