The Cygnus Virus

by Terry Zakreski

  Cruel visions.

  He’s been picking pieces of Astrid’s brain off his arms and now his forearms are scratched and blotchy. He thinks he can hear the flow of electricity. The flow of mean little electron insects. Mean little electron insects flowing all around him, reporting to master electron Cygnus.

  He’s unplugged and switched off every electrical thing he can find and now he’s heading to the basement for the main breaker switch. Time to cut the power to these bugs completely. He’s scratching his arms on the way.

 

  There’s a moment of calm silence before the brain parts start flying again.

  He slides his back down the basement wall and sits on the hard scratchy carpet. It must have been recently installed. The basement stinks of carpet glue. He puts his head in his hands. He sniffles, then he bawls.

  This goes on until he can’t force any more tears.

  The visions continue. He sits there not doing anything about them.

  Let it rain until the rain lets up.

  He gets up, fumbles for the switch.

 

  Power’s on.

  There’s a solitary spider on the floor, hiding in plain sight.

  Andron steps over it and heads back upstairs.

  Live and let live.

  The quietness of the house unnerves him. He misses the unquiet and activity of the shelter. He keeps the TV on. He’s too antsy to watch it.

  For the first few nights, he sleeps on the floor. It didn’t seem right, sleeping up so high.

  He can’t keep himself clean, no matter how hard he scrubs. He sweats hotdogs and sidewalk grease. His mouth tastes like cigarette butts.

  His fucking back is killing him.

  Yessiree, bub.

  Sobering up is a real bum’s rush into the unforgiving light.

  It’s a bright Sunday morning in her mother’s kitchen. They’re having coffee. This is the first they’ve sat down together.

  The first drop-bys she didn’t know what to expect. She brought mace just in case. He said he was going to sober up. Her mother’s house, now a detox facility.

  She wondered if she might find a corpse. Would she call the police or dump the body?

  But the place is clean and he’s alive, quiet and polite. She bought him some clothes to wear. She chastised herself when she caught herself picking things that might look cute on him.

  You’re not dressing up hobo Ken doll, girl. He might still be the worst date rapist in history.

  She attends the interview with jeans, a white tee, leather jacket, hair pulled back in a ponytail. Light on the makeup. Plain Jane.

  She’s got a tape recorder rigged in her purse.

  He’s looking better, shaven, even with raccoon eyes and disheveled hair. His face is etched with suffering and his eyes are somehow bluer. If she were a painter, she would paint him. Portrait of a broken man or date rapist?

  Time for questions.

  “So, you’re looking better.”

  “Thanks, but my before pic is pretty easy to beat. And you, of course, look lovelier than ever.”

  “Uh-huh, in a backyard chores kinda way, right?”

  “Naomi, if you really wanted to make yourself less attractive, you should have gone heavier with the makeup and dressed up a little.”

  “Haven’t lost the silver tongue I see, counselor.”

  They sip on their coffee. She watches Andron bring his mug to his lips and return it to the table deliberately. His hand is steady. She guesses that this is a victory for him.

  “Okay, Andron, so explain again how you were able to date-rape me repeatedly.”

  She moves her purse slightly when she puts her mug down.

  Andron looks at her with his floaty blue eyes. He scratches the scars on his arms through his sweatshirt.

  “I had no idea, Naomi. Cygnus manipulated that MRI that you wrote about to put compulsive thoughts in your head. Same way he said that he could brainwash a killer to come after me.”

  “Leaving aside who Cygnus might be, you’re saying I was brainwashed by an MRI to basically be your sex slave.”

  “Like I said Naomi, I had no idea. I thought. I thought it was because you actually felt something for me.”

  “It didn’t occur to you that something might not have been right with the way I was behaving?”

  “Yeshua Christos, I know now, don’t I?”

  “You’re getting mad? You’re not the one who was fucking raped.”

  They each grab their end of the kitchen table. It’s in danger of being launched.

  “No, of course not. Not possible for me to have been raped. Not possible for me to have my heart torn out, ripped to shreds and then pissed on. Can’t fucking think of it that way, can you?”

  His eyes are staring straight at her, blue flames. His face looks worn and tired. He doesn’t look like man confronted with his crime. He looks like a man down, being kicked again.

  She doesn’t say anything until there’s only the quiet of the kitchen and the Sunday morning sun. At first she wanted to punch him in the face. How does emotional hurt equate to rape? Typical male calculus — always elevating their Y factor over a lady’s X factor. At last, she is convinced of his sincerity, and male stupidity. And she still wants a story.

  “I never meant to hurt you, Andron.”

  “I know. But you should also know that being branded as rapist when I’m not is the worst thing. Naomi, I could never. Would never, hurt you.”

  Puppy dog moment. Stop.

  “So who is Cygnus?”

  “Do you want the truth?”

  “Always and forever.”

  “What I’m about to tell you is going to sound insane. But these events happened and I have proof. I think the short explanation is that I managed to download more than a virus from outer space.”

  “Um, is this a joke?”

  “I’m not joking. I wish I was. It came from a program I downloaded that was supposed to use my computer to download space noise from radio telescopes. Each computer was supposed to analyze it.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Well, it seemed like a great idea to me. Imagine, searching for intelligent life in the universe by trying to pick up the same radio, television and Wi-Fi junk we have been sending out. If we have, then maybe someone else has. Anyway, that was the thinking behind it.”

  “Makes sense.”

  “Well, it seems my computer started a cyber shitstorm because that’s how the person behind your MRI, Cygnus, got here. And that’s what took down the Internet. You may recall they traced the mayhem back to me. Me. And I hardly know how to use a computer.”

  Okaaay…so there’s this crazy person in Mom’s kitchen.

  “Anyway, it was long after my release that this Cygnus guy starts talking to me. He could call me. Send me email. Appear on my screen and talk to me through my speakers. He could do this anywhere, anytime. To prove himself to me, he would fuck around with my bank balances, moving millions.”

  “That would be pretty scary.”

  “It was. Then you. Then you, Naomi. You were someone he used to get to me. He wanted me to see that he could get to me in a physical way at any time, though he thought the whole thing was a joke or that I would be grateful for being able to bang a hot chick, as he put it. I’m telling you, this guy may be from another planet but I doubt he’s their best representative.”

  “So where’s this guy from?”

  That’s the ticket. Remain calm. Let him think you’re buying his story. Don’t mock. Don’t patronize.

  “Well, from a planet he called Earth. Only Earth seemed to be on its last legs when he left and its inhabitants live a mostly digital existence given the atmosphere of their planet has been ruined. Cygnus was able to show me incredible stuff using a 3D device…never mind, we are getting too far ahead.”

  “Are there others?”

  “Beats me. If he made it here, I’m sure others could, though it seems like a long shot. The weird thing i
s that Cygnus didn’t seem to care much about getting in touch with his home planet, so much as chasing after his grandiose plans for himself on this one.”

  “By controlling the Internet?”

  “Well, that, and that he aims to find a way to reincarnate himself using some advanced form of genetic engineering and then later reconnecting himself with his former self through an MRI download, or several of them, I suppose. I guess they’ve mastered this sort of thing on his planet. I think it’s something related to what you experienced with your MRI.”

  “Well, I’m pretty taken aback here, Andron. You said something about proof?”

  Andron reaches behind him and grabs a file folder and hands it to her. She glances trough it. There’s a crumpled bank receipt showing a $10,017,351.69 balance that she puts on the table and pages of what appears to be a hospital record.

  “And these are?”

  “The bank receipt is my personal account. One day it had seventeen thousand dollars, the next it had ten million more. I have no idea how. The rest is my interrogation file that he was able to get.”

  She skims through the file.

  She can hardly believe what she’s reading. The photographs are horrifying. She knew he had been arrested and she saw the scars but he never talked about it. She tries to stay calm because proof of NSS torture would be a colossal story. So, maybe his Y suffering trumps her X in this case after all.

  “This is horrifying, Andron. I had no idea our government was still doing stuff like this. Are you prepared to come forward?”

  “Naomi, there’s a far bigger story here.”

  “Really?”

  She’s holding the interrogation file. The receipt is on the table between them. It becomes the object on which their eyes focus whenever Cygnus’ name comes up, as though he is with them in the room in the form of a crumpled piece of paper.

  “In order to carry out his plans, Cygnus needed to find a lab that could be duped into working with him. Well, I think he found everything he needs and more with this organization aiming to bring Yeshua back by taking the blood from some religious relic and cloning it.”

  Andron gets up and fills up his coffee mug. He offers her some. She shakes her head.

  “Though I think that, instead of Yeshua, they will be bringing back our man Cygnus who, from what I know of him, will very much revel in his rock star status.”

  “Christos.”

  “That’s what I said. Though I think it will be more like the anti-Christos with this guy.”

  Brainwashing, bank fraud, torture, the man whose computer crashed the Internet. A story of an alien invasion and reincarnating Yeshua. A story half-backed by documents.

  Typical stuff they cover in journalism school. Oh yeah. And murder.

  “I guess I should also ask you about the murder charges.”

  “That’s why I had to flee because I knew he’d try and frame me. I loved the kid, I had no reason to harm him. If anything, it shows who we are dealing with.”

  “Right. Cygnus. Does he have a last name?”

  “Way or something. But I think he has several alter egos.”

  “Why are you telling me all this?”

  “A couple of reasons. I want you to have the story. I think you’ve earned it. And I want you to help get me near the hospital where this birth is taking place. You don’t have to worry. If it works out, you’ll have a huge story. If not, we won’t be linked and you’ll have, I think it’s called, plausible deniability.”

  “I’ve heard the phrase.”

  “Anyway, I’m not as worried about Cygnus as much now as I believe him to be in a vulnerable state as he is being remade into a fetus.”

  “And if you did get close, what are you planning to do? Kill a baby?”

  “God, no. I want to try to sabotage the machinery somehow to prevent Cygnus from taking over Yeshua’s body — or whomever they are cloning. As much as I think I could kill a baby knowing that it might become Hitler, I mean Himmler, I could never murder a baby, no matter how bad of a bastard he might become, because I guess there’s always hope.”

  He isn’t looking at her when he says this.

  “This is a lot to digest, Andron. Let me work on it for a while then get back to you. I’ll probably have quite a few questions.”

  They both get up.

  “Just be careful when looking into it not to type, text or speak my name, or reference the Internet crash or any of the things I told you, okay? If you focus on the cloning Yeshua story, you should be safe in case Cygnus is somehow watching.”

  “I will.”

  She gives him a quick hug.

  “Do you need me to get you anything?”

  “No, I think I have everything I need and you saved my life already.”

  She puts on her leather jacket and grabs her purse. She locks the door behind her. She turns to go back in but decides not to.

  She forgot to ask if she can take the file.

  Andron stands for awhile in the lingering scent of Naomi’s hair and vanilla soap.

  He grabs the coffee mugs and the carafe, and washes them in the sink. His hands aren’t shaking anymore. The morning sun hits his face.

  It’s bright, it’s warm, and it’s forgiving.

  Chapter 35:

  Follow the Money

  She’s in her apartment, sitting on her black and silver chaise longue chair, her silver laptop warming her lap, white power cord plugged in. She’s streaming ballads. Puppy dog singers. She has her second glass of red wine in her hand.

  And she’s thinking she’s broken every journalistic ethical rule there is.

  She’s slept with her subject. Taped him without his consent. He’s wanted for murder and she’s providing him with safe haven. She suspects he might be planning an infanticide. She hasn’t told anyone about it. She’s in way over her head with a potential Terra-shattering story.

  And she’s doing it all with a certain savoir-faire.

  She giggles to herself and drinks her wine. She likes wine. She wonders if it’s going to be a problem between them now that he no longer drinks.

  Stop.

  Back up.

  What did you just say?

  Of all your dumb ideas, girl, this is the worst. Get it out of your head. Out. There can be no future with an escaped murderer.

  But he’s probably innocent though.

  Ugh.

  She tap dances search terms on her tablet, human cloning, Yeshua and Church of the Holy Cloth. She hasn’t been following the story and she has to catch up. There are hundreds of pages of search results to wade through. She drinks her wine and reads.

  She makes notes and links to sources. Her fingers go from tap dancing to jitterbugging over her keyboard.

  Any freak of a fetus produced by this experiment has no chance of viability.

  It’s paper-scissors-rock time where technology gets to smash morality. There needs to be a ban. Where will it end? Will we be cloning everyone in history?

  Without the same life experiences, human clones will have little in common with their progenitors. They will likely resent being shoved into legacies they didn’t create and can’t hope to match. Or, they’ll resent having to repeat, “do you want fries with that,” a hundred times a day.

  How did the COHC sidestep regulations? Christosian right lobby? Most Christosian denominations are officially against human cloning experiments, but aren’t turning away parishioners.

  Christosianity is on the rise. Religious intolerance is growing with it. Opposition to the cloning experiment is seen as anti-Christosian rather than a genuine concern about the excesses of technology.

  It may lead to the creation of a new Holy Christosian Empire with a cloned Yeshua at its helm. Gays fear losing their rights, women fear losing access to abortions, and religious minorities fear persecution.

  Good grief. They get ugh-ier.

  The Anti-Christos is coming. Evangelical tour. Repent and prepare. Turn away from false prophets.

&
nbsp; The Anti-Christos is coming. Get ready to serve. The Abortions World Tour. Metal for the Devil.

  Whatever Andron is doing, it wouldn’t hurt to raise awareness against religious whack-jobs seizing power. She’s worked too hard to end up as someone’s handmaid.

  She thinks she’ll pitch the idea of a story to her editor.

  She puts her wine glass in the sink. Rinses it with water. Wonders what she’s going to do about Andron. She needs to get real about this situation. The window on plausible deniability is closing. Interesting story and poor guy and all, but she’s not wasting any more time on him. Lots of better guys around to occupy her thoughts. And he needs to get out of Mom’s soon.

  She runs a shower.

  A steamy waterfall on her smooth skin. Her pores, her pupils, her…opening. Breathing deeper. She closes her eyes, presses her breasts together with her arms to catch the water. Side to side. She rubs her hands on her face. She turns her back to the warm waterfall. Tilts her head back. Lathers soap and runs slippery fingers over her body, over her arms and long legs.

  Her thighs.

  She soaps over her breasts and slides her fingers down to where there’s no lying about whom she is thinking.

  She’s in David Cander’s office, her managing editor.

  “So I want to look into this Church and its funding. How it was able to push this cloning experiment through with little oversight. That kind of thing.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I don’t think many journalists have tried to look into this organization.”

  “I don’t know, Naomi, that sounds pretty depressing to me. That isn’t what your readership has come to expect from you.”

  She looks at her editor with eyebrows raised.

  “So I am expected to do only puff pieces?”

  “That’s not what I said. Look, you’re a respected journalist. It’s just that I don’t think there’s an appetite out there for this sort of thing.”

  “Appetite? Maybe people have a right to know what they’re eating.”

  “Or maybe you’re more concerned about whether they’re eating kosher.”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”