Light Play: Book One of The Light Play Trilogy

by N. D. Hansen-Hill

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  Fictionwise

  www.Fictionwise.com

  Copyright ©2000 by N. D. Hansen-Hill

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  NOTICE: This work is copyrighted. It is licensed only for use by the original purchaser. Making copies of this work or distributing it to any unauthorized person by any means, including without limit email, floppy disk, file transfer, paper print out, or any other method constitutes a violation of International copyright law and subjects the violator to severe fines or imprisonment.

  * * *

  Dedication

  To Gordo, who has always been there for me...

  Acknowledgements

  Thanks to Cindy Bardell, Tashley Hansen-Hill, Patsy Lambert, Kim Minnell, and Frostflower for their help and encouragement, and to both h. henry williams and J. Allan Dodds, for their advice and technical support.

  Light Play

  While a virus holds you in its sway

  The genes insinuate their way

  Into your depths to act the goad,

  Reworking cells to fit their code.

  A kingdom, a phylum, a world apart.

  At core the pith, at breast the heart.

  Their only link the food chain's laws,

  Man's dust to root, plant's dust to jaws.

  But if the two should join and bind,

  What manner of creature will we find?

  An aberrant species? A mutant race?

  To supplant our species and take our place?

  How weak the flesh? How strong the mind?

  Do we leave humanity far behind?

  Should we open our thoughts? Accept the strange?

  Or kill the aberrant, and resist the change?

  —N. D. Hansen-Hill

  Prologue

  The woman stood quietly at the window, gazing unseeing at the day's yellow glare. A sudden jolt stirred her from an unnatural stillness, and she turned away with a swift gasp of fear. “What next?” she wondered aloud.

  Her dash from the room was halted by the recoiling of the cat, which cowered, hissing, near her feet.

  The woman's lips creased in a self-deprecating smile. “Damned cat,” she whispered, recalling yesterday's words. “Which of us is damned now?”

  The feline slunk away—hiding its tomcat's boldness beneath spiky hair and flattened ears.

  Angry with the cat's reaction, the woman moved swiftly toward the far wall.

  The cat—hidden now beneath a chair—dared a backwards glance, just in time to see the human figure drift through the solid plastered wood partition. He chased her departure with a bold yowl.

  The walls echoed his cry, seeming to hold it for just a second too long. When it came back to his ears, the distorted wailing was no longer alone, but held the lonely misery of a human's despairing sigh.

  Chapter One

  “Ho, Rick!”

  Rick could hear Cole's footsteps thudding up the hall.

  “Wanna shoot a few?” Cole's shouts were interspersed with the pounding rhythm of a basketball.

  Rick grinned, glanced at the pile of papers he had yet to read, and shook his head. “Go away. I'm busy,” he yelled back.

  Cole, certain now that Rick was home, jogged into the room. Rick was determinedly reading through some article—highlighting what must have been—for him—particularly edifying passages. “That's not busy—” Cole argued. He threw the ball at Rick's chair. It missed, rebounding instead off Rick's arm, and onto his Coke can. “Now, you'll be busy,” Cole muttered, as he watched the sticky liquid flow towards Rick's stack of journals.

  “Dammit, Cole!” Rick looked around for something to mop up the spill.

  Cole pulled his handkerchief out of his pocket and threw it to his friend.

  Rick looked at it dubiously. “Got any forceps?” He took the cloth by the corner, and dropped it in the path of the runaway Coke.

  Cole laughed. “If it sticks, it won't be because of the Coke—”

  “If it sticks, I'll use your face to scrape it off.”

  “If you had more dirty clothes laying around, I wouldn't have to donate my stuff to the cause.”

  "Go away. I'm trying to concentrate.”

  “Why? Because you're on some fool fungus hunt?” Cole reached over, and flipped through the pages of the article Rick was trying to read. “What is this, anyway? ‘Protein synthesis during spore formation in Aspergillus’? I hate to tell you this, Rick, but I think your brain is warped.”

  Rick gave him a shove. “At least with me, it stops at my brain.”

  “You should get a burglar alarm—”

  Rick interrupted him. “To keep out unwelcome guests?”

  Cole grinned, then grew serious. “I mean it, Rick. Half the time, you don't even remember to lock your door.”

  Rick shrugged. “Then, what's the point? I'd probably forget to set the alarm, too.” He gestured at the stacks of books and journals. “What are they going to steal? My computer?” he asked seriously. “I'm insured, and all my files are backed up at the lab.”

  “What about your TV?” Rick shook his head. Cole tried again. “Your stereo?”

  “Old. They wouldn't be able to unload it.”

  Cole grinned. “What about you? Isn't any of that so-called science worth something?”

  “Only if you're in horticulture.” Rick jumped up and plopped his journal on to the floor. Creeping to the window, he took a quick, guarded look outside, then flattened himself against the wall. "My God, you're right!" he whispered loudly, infusing horror into his voice. “The farmers—they're massing!” He fumbled with the cord to the drapes, as though his fingers were slippery with sweat. With a grand gesture, he yanked it, while the rod squeaked in protest. Dropping to his knees, he wiped his brow, and said dramatically, “I think we're safe now!”

  Cole threw the basketball at him, and missed again—this time knocking over a stack of photocopied articles.

  Rick looked at the mess and sighed. “I give up,” he said. He swooped up the basketball, and shoved Cole ahead of him out of the room. “Someone's got to teach you some basketball, and it might as well be me.”

  * * * *

  I'm too damn tired for this. Dark spots in the room shivered and writhed, under the doubly potent assault of fatigue and nerves. Daniel Vizar found his eyes shifting again and again to those elusive centres of activity. Beneath his brooding self-derision, there lay a very real fear. Relax, Danny Boy, he told himself. Aberrant genes don't lurk.

  Justin Sacchara's entry was noisy. Shaking hands restlessly jiggled his keys, and he slammed the door unnecessarily loudly in his efforts to ensure it was fully closed.

  Daniel didn't know whether to be relieved by Sacchara's company, or annoyed by the man's irritating nervousness that rubbed so gratingly against his own.

  It didn't take him long to decide. Go to hell, Justin, Daniel thought. He sensed the slight, but unquestionably envious, resentment that was always part of Justin Sacchara's personality in this office. The resentment that always triggered Vizar's own feelings of guilt at the plushness of his surroundings. The reaction bothered him—especially now, when he had so many other things to worry about. His claims to all this re-emphasised just how much responsibility sat on his shoulders. Daniel Vizar would have relinquished the lot right now for just one moment of unburdened peace.

  He was over-reacting, and it didn't take him long to realise it. Sacchara didn't give a damn about their surroundings—his quick glance around the room was merely to reassure himself that they were alone.

  Guilt and fear were obviously weighing heavily on Sacchara's shoulders as well, and Daniel guessed the other man was f
ighting a losing battle against his doubts regarding their work. Vizar thought back to the days when his own personal convictions had raised havoc with his work habits. It had taken years before the guilt associated with his job had faded—carefully suppressed by the firm conviction that he was actively moulding the future.

  “What the hell are we going to do?” When Justin Sacchara finally spoke, his voice was almost strident. Vizar could see the panic in his dilated eyes; in the sweat glistening on the other man's brow.

  “Calm down, for crissakes! You look like you need a fix!”

  “You familiar with junkies, Vizar?” Sacchara retorted nastily. “Should we add them to your list of would-be consumers?”

  Vizar sat down behind the desk, and dropped his face into his hands. “There's got to be a way out of this, Justin. None of this should have happened.” His words were earnest. “Caroline just—” He left it hanging.

  “Caroline just opted for a little self-experimentation.”

  “Not exactly,” Daniel muttered.

  Sacchara stopped his pacing and whirled to face the other man. “What do you mean?” he asked incredulously. “What's this ‘not exactly’?”

  “It got away from her.” Vizar's eyes were grim as he corrected himself. “Into her.”

  "Jesus Christ!" There was whispered horror in the words. “How?”

  Daniel Vizar shrugged. “I don't know. I tried to decipher her notes, but they're encoded.” He gave a grim smile. “I don't think Caro trusted us.”

  Sacchara started to pace again. “So you're saying there might be some of these rogue genes running around her lab? Waiting to do this to someone else?” He glanced at Vizar. “Do we even know the method of acquisition? What vectors she was using?”

  Vizar shook his head. “We can establish some parameters, and we've locked down the lab against contamination.”

  “Not good enough—” Sacchara began.

  “You're right,” Vizar agreed. “If it's airborne, we might still be in trouble.”

  Something in the other man's tone made Sacchara look at him hopefully. “But you don't think so—” Vizar's smile was strained, but Sacchara read what he wanted to see. “So it's a one-off. A singular event.” Sacchara rubbed tense fingers across his unshaven chin. “Unless Caro dies.” He dropped into a chair, and looked at Vizar with tense eyes. “Are we going to be able to put this behind us?”

  Vizar met his inquiry squarely. “No,” he replied firmly.

  “Why the hell not? Are you worried about the doctor? The technicians?”

  Vizar shook his head. “Nobody knows enough to put it all together, Justin.”

  “Then why?” The strain was back in Sacchara's voice.

  Daniel Vizar shook his head in disbelief. There were times when Sacchara could be really obtuse. “Because, Justin—for better or worse—Caroline's damned procedure worked.”

  * * * *

  Cole did a body builder's flex, showing off the line of sweat staining his T-shirt. “It all goes to show you,” he began. He tried to spin the ball on the tip of his finger—only to have it wobble off and bounce on to Rick's foot.

  “What?” Rick grunted, trying to rub his big toe through the fabric of his shoe. “That the hoop's only slightly bigger than the hole in your head?”

  “You're just hacked off because you were going to refine my game, and I beat your tail off—”

  “Just because you can push someone around on the court, doesn't mean you win—”

  “Sure it does,” Cole replied casually. “I didn't score, but I didn't let you score either—”

  “What about that one I sank at the beginning?”

  “When we were warming up? Doesn't count.”

  “'Warming up’ my ass—”

  “I don't give a damn about your ass, but mine's getting cold.” Cole grinned. “Want to come over to watch the game?”

  “What game?”

  “Typical. Don't you ever keep on top of anything?”

  Rick grinned. “Not recently. Or a-breast of it either—”

  It was an old joke. “There's this girl—”

  “No, and no, and no.”

  “But—”

  “No,” Rick said firmly. “If you like her so much, you take her out.”

  “I tried,” Cole said mournfully. “She turned me down.”

  Rick grinned. “In that case, maybe I would like to meet her. At least she's selective.”

  * * * *

  It was happening again, and Caroline Denaro had no way of stopping it. Vaguely, in her somnolent state, she was aware of her existence, in some subconscious world far from the tubes and respirator that were keeping her alive. In that dim world she was at least able to find peace.

  It was now—at times like this—when the separation was about to happen—that Caroline felt the agony. Screams that never brought help. Torture that went on and on and on.

  None of it was physical. She could have borne it better if she could have rid herself of it by chopping off a leg, or surrendering an organ. No, it was the uncertainty of eternity that ripped at her. The knowledge that she wasn't dead, yet had no prayer for living. The ever-present danger that her body wouldn't accept her back.

  She'd tried to puzzle it out—to determine where the gene had come from that could make the transition from body to out-of-body so easy to accomplish. The one that could turn a normal existence into a dual one. The one that could forever lay to rest any doubts about the human soul.

  “It must have been the meristematic genes,” she whispered, wondering by what means she could hear her own voice—all accomplished without the aid of a larynx, or those lovely, tiny bones of the inner ear. “Something about my body chemistry changed them. Gave them a purpose they were never meant to have. God!" she cried out, all the while wondering how a concerned deity could allow someone to suffer like this, “Please, God! Find a way to get me back! To make me whole again!"

  * * * *

  They were tearing through the quiet streets at Cole's customary gravel-spinning speed before Cole spoke again. “Hey, Rick,” he said, a little too casually. “While we're out, what d'you say we go by the house I want to rent?”

  “I knew it!”

  “Knew what?”

  “That once I left the house I'd never get back to work. I need to finish that report by Monday, Cole.”

  “That's almost forty hours away. Plenty of time.” He added reasonably, “You said you'd help me move in. How're you going to do that if you don't know where it is? Don't you even want to see what you're letting yourself in for?”

  Rick replied, just as reasonably, “Sure, I want to see it. I just don't want to see it right now—”

  “Great!” Cole replied, turning into the driveway of a newer stucco Spanish-style residence. “This is it!”

  I should've known I was wasting my breath. But, in spite of his irritation, Rick couldn't help being impressed. “Nice place!” Then he remembered what Cole had said about the rent. “Why is it so cheap?” he asked curiously.

  “It's owned by some corporation. They usually house their own people here, but for some reason, it's come up empty.” Cole grinned. “I guess they're worried about vandalism. They think I'll keep out ‘undesirable elements’.”

  “They figured once you were in, there wouldn't be room for any more?” Rick asked innocently. “What corporation did you manage to mislead?”

  Cole pulled a tattered business card out of his ashtray. Everything in Cole's car tended to get tattered. “Genetechnic Industries—”

  Rick snatched the card out of his hand. “Genetechnic! They're headliners in the gene machine market.”

  “Didn't I tell you you'd like this place?” Cole pulled a tagged key out of his pocket.

  Rick looked at it. “You had this all planned, didn't you?”

  Cole shrugged. “Sure.” He pushed open the door, and gestured at the interior. “This place is me—”

  “Vacant?” Rick interrupted, grinning.

>   “No—great looks, flash exterior—”

  Rick poked his head into the stark entryway. “Any piles of bullshit in there?”

  * * * *

  It was no good. God wasn't listening. Caro fled, unable to endure the sight of her empty body poised on the edge of non-existence.

  She drifted through the halls of the facility, searching for Tom or Sutte, the only people who understood her research enough to do something to correct it. If she could locate one of them, she'd find a way to make them acknowledge her—just as she had with the cat. She'd fought hard to develop some physical presence—so that she could access her lab book and research notes, still hidden in her former residence. Without them, no one would have a hope of deciphering the route her research had taken.

  When she'd hidden her lab notes, she'd felt slightly paranoid, but she had to admit that the fear of industrial theft wasn't her real motivation. Caro knew her successes were big, and probably worth a helluva lot more than she was being paid. Encryption was a small effort for what could have eventuated into a large reward.

  Caro thought of the greed and recognition that were so important to her then. It took an incorporeal existence to put me in my place, she thought. Religious fervour arriving on the tail of desperation. Some things about her hadn't changed, however. I'd do anything—say anything—to get myself out of this non-living hell—

  * * * *

  The thud was muffled, but it still sounded loud in the empty room. “Shit! What was that?" Cole was feeling jumpy, and he couldn't figure out why. Maybe it's just because I want Rick to be as impressed with this place as I am. Impressing Rick—at least in this small respect—was important to him. And a little twinge of envy on his part wouldn't hurt either.

  He knew that Rick had worked hard to become a scientist, but sometimes Cole got a little sick of it when Rick was introduced as Dr. Richard Lockmann. Somehow, he couldn't equate his old friend with the fancy title. And, his work ain't all that fancy either. Cole couldn't imagine working with fungus and bacteria all day, any more than he guessed Rick could imagine doing marketing.