PR: The Power Lives On CH.2

Chapter Two: This is Where it Begins</b></u>

Janice...Find the coins and bring them to me. I will use them to make sure that no one will ever bother us again. We can research them, get them to work. Together we will rule the world with their power! "No, no one is supposed to use them like that! No one person is supposed to have that much power!" Janice yells into the darkness at the voice that surrounds her. But Janice, you know that those coins are more trouble than they are worth, just bring them to me and I will relieve that burden from you."No! I won't!" she yells again. BRING THEM TO ME!!

"Janice wake up!" Janice jolts awake, the voice of her new assistant, Timothy Kingston jerking her out of the nightmare. "What? Tim, was I asleep?" She asks, still a little groggy. "Yes you were. What do you expect? You have been working like a machine for the past three months." He says, relieved that she is finally awake. "I'm sorry. I guess I have been working kind of hard... I think I'm gonna get some coffee.” She replies, wiping the sleep from her eyes. Standing, she moves to the coffee pot at the back of the lab.

I have to figure out which DNA sequences match, I can’t let the coins fall into the wrong hands. I just need to figure out how to get the coins out of here once these people are found. I just have the feeling that they aren’t safe here. As she is getting her coffee the phone in the lab rang. She picks it up, saying, “Hello?” “Any progress made in the genetic sequences?” comes the voice on the other end. “No, we haven’t found any matches yet, and we’ve gone through at least a twenty thousand DNA samples,” she replies while sipping the coffee she just poured. “Well, you know how to reach us when one of the sequences matches,” the voice finishes and Janice heard a click.

Hanging up the phone, she put on the surgical gloves that were in the office and began the process of testing the coins. She starts by moving the sample over the coin to be tested, front and back. Then she moves it over the next coin with the same process doing this until she finishes with all the coins. Then she passes the sample to Timothy to encode the number on the sample in the computer. It had become a habit for her. She fears she is still doing it when she sleeps. She is the only one to ever touch the coins, so these tests are pretty monotonous.

At least six month of testing and no reactions. Not a single one. Do these coins even still work or did the recharging process damage them? She asks herself. She has the feeling that eventually one would work; she just doesn’t know which one. “This is worse than a needle in a haystack…” She mumbles to no one in particular. “Yeah, this is more like taking all the hay in the world and stacking it up. Then hiding six needles in that,” Timothy replies. They both chuckle. That conversation had been driven into the ground over the past three months, yet it still got the only laugh that they ever had. “One of these days, you are going to have to find a better way of doing this,” Timothy says, punching in the numbers.

“And one of these days, you’re gonna have to find a way to get me out of this lab,” Janice replies, smiling a little under the surgical mask. Timothy stands up and stretches his back and neck, popping them and his knuckles. Janice leans back in her chair and looks at him, “You know that’s bad for you—Crap!” Timothy tries to lunge forward to catch her but he is just a little too late. Doctor Thompson’s chair falls out from under her and slams into her desk. She hits hard on the floor, banging her elbow and head.

“Owwww…” she mumbles as her assistant helps her up. “You ok?” he asks. “Yeah, I was just stupid. These chairs with wheels aren’t as stable as they should be,” she replies, getting to her feet. “Alright, well, let’s make sure that everything is here,” Tim says while looking at her desk. “Yeah, good idea…well, none of the samples are broken, that’s always a good thing. Gloves, masks, goggles…all the medical stuff is here. Wait…” Janice says. “What?” comes the reply.

“We’re missing P.M. number 2. The one that looked like a wooly mammoth or a mastodon,” she says, looking all over her desk. As he stands the chair back up, Tim sees a glint under the doctor’s desk. “I think I found it,” he says as he reaches under the desk. Grabbing the coin quickly he stops as he goes to hand it to Janice. “What?” she asks. “I think my DNA is the one this coin requires,” he says as he stares at the coin in his hand. Black-colored static discharges around the coin but apparently isn’t hurting the assistant in any way.

Slowly, Timothy gives the coin back to the woman that is looking on in disbelief. “That’s the reaction that we were looking for…” she says, unable to believe that the coin chose him. “I don’t know why or how…” the stunned assistant replies, unable to comprehend the reasoning behind the coin. “Look, soon the agents will be here, I don’t know what they are going to do, but I doubt they will hurt you. You know how the government is, hurry up and wait,” Janice says quickly.

As soon as she finishes her sentence, a man in a black suit comes in and says, “Mr. Timothy Kingston, I need you to come with us. We have some tests to perform.” “What kind of tests?” Janice says before her assistant can say anything. “No, Doctor Thompson, it’s ok. Keep looking for the other five needles ok?” Timothy says as he steps closer to the men. “Tim, I need you here, I need your help,” she says, not having any clue what is going on. “I’ll be back in a few hours, you know the government, hurry up and wait,” he replies. As he follows the men out, Janice places the coin at the edge of the desk and goes back to testing.

After a few hours, she hears a knock on the door. Answering it quickly, she sees Timothy standing there. “Tim, you’re ok!” she says a little louder than she means to. “Yeah, I’m okay. They just asked me some weird questions about my family history. Like who the grandmother of my dad’s grandmother was,” he says, putting a hand on her shoulder. They both walked back into the lab and he looks at the container of vials of samples. “What? You couldn’t put them into the computer yourself?” he asks. “No, that’s your job and you said you would be back,” she replies with a slight hint of sarcasm. Laughing, he sits back down and begins his work again.

“Well, now that we have proven they still work, we have to find a way to tap into the power in them,” Janice says, concentrating on swiping the samples over the coins. “That’s gonna be the interesting part, although I don’t think it will be that hard. When I had that coin in my hand, I heard a word over and over in my head. It was more like a whisper, but it kept saying ‘mastodon’,” Timothy replies, concentrating on his work. Janice stops and thinks for a while. “Can’t hurt…” she mumbles as she grabs the coin that chose Timothy.

Putting her hand on his shoulder over the coin, she asks him, “What was that word?” “What ‘mastodon’?” Timothy replies. As he says that word, fingers of the same black static discharge the two of them saw earlier emanated from his shoulder where the coin was resting. Janice yanks her hand away, but the coin stays. The static bolts spread from that point along with a shadowy form. When they finish, Timothy is in a form-fitted black body suit with an enlarged version of the stylized mammoth centered in gold on his chest. His head is covered by a very sleek and futuristic helmet. Two golden colored eyes are centered at the front near the top. Two silvery curved tusks make their way from near the eyes to the front of the helmet, curving up right above three slits that are where Timothy’s mouth should be. Right above the tusks is a piece of tinted black glass or plastic that should be a visor, Janice thinks as she stares at it.

The transformation seems to be complete, so Janice reaches forward and taps the helmet. Timothy turns and asks, “What?” “Um…er…” Janice stammers and just points at the reflective metal of the desk, where the coin used to be. “Hey, where’d the coin go?” Timothy asks, looking down at the desk where it was, “Wait…what the… where did I get this helmet? Hell, where did I get this suit?”  Examining his hands and arms, he likes what he sees. Then a thought hits him, “How do I get it off?” “That I’m not sure of…” Janice replies completely puzzled at Timothy’s current situation, “Maybe there is some sort of keyword that undoes the transformation.”

“Oh boy, this is going to be fun,” Timothy says as he scratches the top of the helmet like he would his head. “Ok, Power down…” he says, but nothing happens, “Ok, revert, ummm… de-power, undo…” “Okay that’s not working obviously,” the doctor says, trying to think of a good word or phrase, “Wait, here’s a thought, what if you just try to take off the helmet?” “There are no clasps or zippers or anything like that anywhere on this thing,” Timothy says as he feels on the headgear. “Just try pulling it off,” Janice suggests. “Okay, but it isn’t going to work…” he says as he reaches to pull the helmet off. As he pulls, the suit pulls upward into the helmet, his normal clothes apparently under it. When he gets the helmet off, there is a flash of light and there is nothing but the coin left in his hand. “That was weird,” the recently unsuited assistant says as he examines the coin in his hand.

“Wait, I think I have a way to speed this up,” the doctor says to Timothy. “What do you need me to do?” he asks, trying to figure out the best way to speed up the process. “I need a sample from you,” she says, her idea clicking into place. “You already have it. It’s near the end of the samples from the lab, although, I don’t know how it will help,” he replies, scratching his head. “Alright give me a minute then, I’ll explain it shortly,” Janice picks up the white phone in the lab and says, “I need Timothy Kingston’s DNA sample immediately. I have an idea that may speed this process up to near microscopic amounts of time compared to the old system.”

Within the hour, Janice Thompson is running down the hallway to another laboratory. Timothy is chasing after her, because he still doesn’t know the plan. “Here it is D5, genetics,” she says as she knocks on the door. A cracked voice replies, “Come on in.” Janice opens the door quickly and asks the older man sitting in the room, “Can you compare two different DNA samples and figure out how they are different?” “Yes, but there are many variables that I would need to eliminate, like race, gender, and age of the two people,” the older man says as he looks to his recent visitors.

“Okay, well, I can give you that information. I just need two DNA samples compared quickly and accurately,” Janice says to him. “Alright, I just need the samples,” he replies. “Thank you,” she says, handing him two vials of blood. He gets a drop out of each and places it in the solution in a smaller vial. The machine spins for a moment then grabs one of the two vials that had some of the DNA, taking a drop of the solution. It does the same to the other vial.

After a moment or two, a small report is printed from the machine. Making some notes with the information that Janice gives him, the older man says, “Taking into consideration the information that you gave me, there is only one sequence different in the two samples. That sequence I have named the Y-factor.” “So this Y-factor is what is causing the reaction…” Janice mumbles, examining the printouts, “How quickly could you compare and find this Y-factor if given, say, one hundred samples?” “Given all the variables that I just requested from you, it would take a couple of hours with some help,” the man says, pushing up his thick glasses.

“Alright, well, that’s exactly what we need,” Janice says to the older doctor. Picking up the phone that’s near the entrance of the lab, she tells the person that picks up, “We have a way to speed up the process exponentially. Granted, its still gonna take a while but I’ll need all the samples and statistics that go with them. Age, race, and gender are mainly what we’re looking at. How quickly can I have all that?” “You can have that very quickly, but what exactly are we looking for?” the voice questions. “It’s a difference in a single genetic sequence, give me an hour and a half and I can have a briefing together,” she says, talking fast.

An hour later, she’s walking down the hall with Timothy in tow. “Ok, I understand why you need to be there, but why do I have to be there?” he asks, trying to keep up with the doctor. “You still have the coin right?” she asks, holding onto some papers tightly. “No…crap! I left it in the lab. I’ll be right back,” he says, his shoes squeaking to a stop. “What? Ok, just meet me on level three, in room twelve,” she says, looking over her shoulder while still walking quickly. I can find those other five needles, I just need some time, she thinks, getting into an elevator that takes her to level three.

Quickly setting up, she turns on the projector in the room. The administration files in, taking their usual seats. The video screen in the back turns on as the same man that Janice is still assuming is the president sits down. “Evening gentlemen, I have a small breakthrough in a way we can search for the people that activate the coins. Our problem before was the fact that we didn’t even have one person that activated the coins, so we had no idea what we were looking for,” she begins.

             “Wait a minute, are you saying you found someone that can activate the coins?” the military man asks of the doctor. “Actually I found someone that can activate one of the coins,” she replies, “Each coin is activated by a different DNA sequence.” “We know your assistant caused a reaction in one of the coins, but how do you know how to activate them?” the man in the black suit questions. “Well that was an accident, but point is we know how to do it,” she replies, trying to slow down the questioning until she can show it to them, “We have named the mysterious sequence that we assume activates the coin the ‘Y-factor’.”

As she puts the first projector sheet onto the machine, she hears the door open. Tim slowly enters, nodding at her. “This sequence was found when I compared my DNA, a person that doesn’t activate any of the coins, to someone that does, like my assistant here,” she says, looking in the direction of Timothy. “So, you assume that this DNA sequence is one that we need,” the president asks. “Yes, we…I do. When taking away all the variables, like age, race and gender, every person on the planet has the exact same DNA, we are all human,” she retorts, slightly aggravated by the fact that she has to repeat herself.

“Well, are the people that have this ‘Y-factor’ not human?” the military man probes. “No, no, nothing like that, Timothy please step forward,” she says, turning back to her assistant. As he steps up, she continues, “Now, my assistant Timothy Kingston, he grew up in a small town in Colorado just south of Denver. His mother is a nurse at a local hospital and his father is a moderately successful businessman that works in Denver. You wouldn’t even believe he was any different from anyone else until he came here.” Timothy coughs a little at that, always thinking that he was a little smarter than most people.

“Mr. Kingston, please prove to us that the coins still work by activating the one that you have,” a man at the curve of the U-shaped table says, crossing his arms. “Tim, if you please,” Janice says after a moment of hesitation by Timothy. “Alright,” Timothy says while holding the coin between his forefinger and thumb, “Mastodon.” With that word, black static creeps along his body as the same transformation happens, only this time originating at Timothy’s hand. All of the members of the administration look on in shock and awe as this happens.

“Now, the suit seems to be made of nothing more than black, form-fitting cloth. The helmet seems to be made of some kind of hard plastic or maybe even Kevlar,” Janice began, pointing toward each of the objects while she is describing it, “Now Timothy, do you feel any sort of weight on your head or neck?” “No, I feel like I’m standing in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, wearing some very light boots and a hat,” the assistant replies, “The only way I know it is different is by actually touching the helmet.” The same resounding silence that was in the room when Janice first began explaining the coins comes again.

The first one to speak is the man in the black suit, “Wait, you’re telling us that the cloth is relatively weightless?” “Yes, pretty much, I know it’s there when I look in a mirror or something like that, but I don’t notice it otherwise,” Timothy says as Janice is opening her mouth. Pulling the helmet of the suit off, Timothy continues to explain, “Deactivating the coins is just as easy as activating them. I simply pull the helmet off and the suit comes with it.” After the flash of light that tells Janice he’s done, she chimes in, “Now we just need to test the DNA for this Y-factor and we can have it found within a few months.” Dr. Thompson’s audience nods as she shuts off the projector.