Chapter #3A Summer's Day by: imaj   “Darcy,” yells Summer, thumping on the stall door. “Darcy, open up.”
Not good. Not good at all. Unless you do something Summer is likely to try to open the door herself in a minute. You still have no idea what caused you to absorb Darcy within yourself this morning, or if you can even do it again. Maybe you only get one shot at absorbing a person. Maybe you can’t ever absorb another person at all. Either way, Summer is a more pressing problem than the unconscious Darcy. Absorb her, knock her out, whatever, it doesn’t matter just so long as you can get the hell out of here.
“I’m coming out,” you try to say in falsetto. Not the most convincing idea you’ve had, but the strange thing is it works - it doesn’t just sound higher than your normal voice, it sounds exactly like Darcy. You consider the possibility that the SX-3 has left you with some residual memory of being Darcy but decide to think more on it later.
You hear Summer take a step back away from the door. It’s do or die time. You fumble with the stall lock before opening the door as suddenly as you can. Although Summer is looking directly at you she is simply too stunned at your unexpected appearance to do anything other than stare blankly at you with her mouth open. That gives you ample time to take the two steps over to her and place your right hand firmly over her mouth. You push the increasingly frightened looking young woman back against the row of sinks on the far wall, pinning her in place.
“Mmmpf,” she tries to say, her voice muffled.
Roughly, you spin her round with your free arm, looping it round her chest and holding her in tight against her yourself. Staring at your reflection in the large mirror that runs along the wall above the sinks you will the change to happen. Below your own reflected image you can see Summer’s eyes start to dart wildly from side to side. She’s struggling, trying desperately to break out of your grip. You were never particularly strong, but Summer is at least a foot shorter than you and quite thin. It’s easy enough to hold her in place. Again you will the change to begin.
Nothing happens.
It’s not working. Panicking, you think back to what happened this morning: Darcy arriving at the door. Darcy getting the papers out her bag. Darcy giving you the papers. No. That’s not right, she dropped the papers as you reached to take them. That’s when it happened, when you tried to take something from her.
It seems like a long shot, but what other option do you have. You start thinking about what you want to take: Her body, her memories, her very identity. Just as Summer is trying to stamp the heel of her boot onto your foot, you feel your flesh starting to flow. The boot sinks painlessly into your foot with a squelch. Summer’s eyes go wide for a moment as she spots the fingers of your right hand, the one held over her mouth, starting to fuse together. Then she goes limp. You watch, horrified, as she is drawn within your body, your melting flesh lapping round her, pulling her in. She sinks within you, leaving a misshapen mess – still recognisably Mark Taylor but weirdly distorted and with unsightly bumps and protrusions all over your body.
You burp loudly.
Then the changes start to happen. Bones grind and pop as they shift themselves into new shapes. Flesh bubbles and swells, padding out some areas and thinning in others. You watch as your hair starts to lengthen, turning a shiny black in places and hot pink in others. Amazingly, it lifts itself up of its own accord and ties itself into the bunches Summer was wearing. While you can barely feel the changes that write themselves across your face, at least in comparison to the ones on the rest of your body, they are fascinating to watch in the mirror. It is as if your skin crawls, stretching itself into a new shape, pulling at your eyes to give them an exotic looking slant, squeezing your nose into a small delicate shape.
Then you are Summer Nguyen, 19 years old and a student at Keyserling College. Struggling to make ends meet because you are estranged from your father. Tired out from the stress of studying and working part time, but ultimately happy because your life is your own. At least it was until five minutes ago. Hidden inside this shell is your real self, beyond the detection of the military and Protean Industries. You cannot help but smile. Just the way Summer would.
You’ll have time to investigate your new identity more thoroughly later you think as you pick up Summer’s satchel from where she dropped it. There’s one last detail to attend to – Darcy. She’s still lying prone in the stall. Finding out what she remembers of this morning would be useful, so you give her a gentle shake until she starts to stir.
“Where… Where am I,” Darcy asks slowly as you help her to her feet. “Summer? What’s going on?”
“Are you ok,” you ask, perfectly mimicking the kind of concern Summer would show in the situation. “I think you fainted or something.”
“Where am I” ask Darcy again, this time a little more insistently as she regains her composure.
“Uh, the toilets,” you respond a little mischievously.
“Obviously,” replies Darcy a little wearily. “And where are the toilets?”
“Penn Hall, at Keyserling. You mean you don’t know how you got here,” you add, feigning ignorance.
“I wouldn’t ask otherwise,” says Darcy, staring meaningfully at you. “The last thing I remember is… Oh god, the test!”
“Already done, and you just told me you thought you did well.”
There is a moment of awkward silence.
“Maybe I’ve been pushing myself to hard,” says Darcy, sounding uncharacteristically unsure of herself.
“Well, you did mention something about being up all night,” you respond, shrugging your shoulders. “You really remember nothing at all until you got here?”
“Nothing. I was at Dr Harding’s, she’s the one helping me out with my biosciences course,” explains Darcy. “And now I’m here. Nothing in between.”
“Maybe it’s stress,” you say, trying to conceal how pleased you are to hear that she doesn’t remember what’s happened to her. “You should get some rest, I’m sure you’ll feel better tomorrow.”
“Yeah,” says Darcy, although she doesn’t sound convinced. “I should go home.”
“I’ll catch you later,” you say with a cheery wave as you walk out the door.
*****
Darcy may be heading to bed, but Summer’s day is just beginning. Living out her life, keeping a low profile, seems like a good idea right now. It will give you a chance to see if there is any major reaction to your disappearance. Since Summer isn’t directly connected to you in the same way Darcy is, it is unlikely that your new identity will attract immediate suspicion from anyone who starts to guess what the SX-3 has done to you.
With that in mind you spend an hour or so pottering about in the campus library. Summer is an arts major. Not exactly your strong suit, but with her mind at your command you easily manage the work she had planned. After that, you make your way over to the coffee house where she works part time, arriving just in time for the start of her shift.
It’s an independent operation, not part of any big chain and just a little bit upmarket. Sitting just on the edge of the Keyserling campus and close to the research park where Protean Industries is located. The clientele is a mix of post-grads, lecturers and workers from the research park. Students tend to keep out unless they work for the place. As the lunchtime trade picks up, you find yourself kept very busy. So busy you don’t notice when someone you, the real you, know comes in until they order their ‘coffee, just coffee, black with none of that junk you seem to insist on putting into it’.
Claire Briggs, Lieutenant Claire Briggs, is a friend of Jillian’s, and her connection back to the military base you both worked at last year. It’s odd for her to be out this way, since Fort Suffolk is on the other side of Saratoga Falls. You watch surreptitiously as she sits herself at an empty table and unfolds a newspaper and starts to read it. She’s clearly waiting for someone.
You get a shock when her guest arrives. Jillian walks in, orders a coffee from one of your co-workers and sits beside Claire. The two immediately fall into a hushed conversation. Despite your best efforts to hang around them, clearing tables and taking orders, you can’t overhear anything more than the odd word from the pair.
You find yourself desperate to know what is being discussed, and frustrated that there seems to be no way to find out. The conversation goes on for some time as the lunchtime rush starts to calm down and the coffee house empties. Yet still, you can’t hear what’s being said. You are on the verge of giving up when Claire excuses herself and makes her way to the toilet.
It worked this morning, why not now? You could follow her and read the conversation from her memories. You could even wait and see if Jillian makes a visit. On the other hand, the coffee house is still busy and you don’t want to risk being seen. It might be better to stick to your plan to lay low as Summer.   indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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