Transformations - Book of Adam Ch. 03

Which meant she would be over seventy back in Adam's time.

He saw Pike standing near a tall beige apartment building. It had deep roofs and high gables. The street out front was almost deserted.

He walked up to Pike. "Can other people see you? Or, do I look like a schizophrenic talking to myself?"

"Yeah, man, I'm a projection, not a ghost."

Adam smiled when he noticed he could see his own breath in the cold air, but not Pike's. Also, Pike looked perfectly comfortable in his t-shirt and jeans on the chilly Manhattan street.

Pike turned and pointed at the building. "This is The Dakota Apartments. Lot of famous artists and musicians live here, man."

"One of them going to jump from a dormer or something?" Adam asked.

"No, wise ass. Nobody's jumping." He nodded toward the arched entrance of the building. "A guy and his wife are going to get here in a little while. Nice couple." He turned to Adam. "See the guy down the street. Dark hair, big glasses?"

Adam looked over Pike's shoulder. "Yeah. What about him?"

"His name is Mark. Mark is going to do something really bad in a few minutes."

Adam watched the man. He was a little older than Adam, but not by much. Five years, maybe. "So, I'm here to stop him?"

"If you want. Or, I mean don't. It's your choice, Adam."

Adam swallowed. "He's going to kill someone, isn't he?"

"Yes. A wise man told me once, he said: 'all life is sacred, and everyone is worth saving'. You have to start someplace."

Adam nodded and walked around Pike.

"Adam?"

Adam didn't turn around. "Yeah?"

"You're working without a net, man. You're strong, you've got abilities you don't know about yet. But, you're not invulnerable. Remember that. Also, that shit that Demona was pumping into you? The Fluoride? It's worn off by now. You got your brain mojo back."

Adam turned, but Pike was gone.

He walked down the street in front of the Dakota. There was a doorman there trying to stay warm in the cold night air.

The man Pike called Mark looked nervous. He was wearing a t-shirt under his coat advertising an old rock star named Todd Rundgren. He had one hand in his coat pocket, in the other he held a tattered copy of 'Catcher in the Rye'.

He glanced at Adam, his eyes darting left and right.

And, Adam reached into his mind.

His name was Mark David Chapman. Inside the man's mind, he saw a memory of Chapman confronting a tall, thin man earlier in the day. The man was the singer, James Taylor. More memories flashed by. An album called 'Double Fantasy' - Mark holding it out to someone who signed it.

Memories moving faster now. 'Catcher in the Rye' and Mark felt like he was Holden Caulfield and he loved all the albums and why would Lennon say that awful thing about the Beatles being more famous than Jesus and he would show him. 'Catcher in the Rye' was his manifesto and he was Holden Caulfield and Lennon was nothing but a phony living like a king. He's famous and he's going to die...

Adam turned to his left as the limousine pulled up.

A man got out and it was the glasses that gave away who it was. Small black glasses with round lenses. His wife, a rail-thin Asian woman got out with him.

Mark's hand in his pocket closed on the cold steel of the.38 Special revolver and Adam felt it. He broke the contact.

Mark's head snapped back, and a trickle of blood came out of his left nostril.

Adam's right hand shot out and went into Mark's coat pocket. His hand closed on Mark's hand and the gun within it. Adam squeezed.

With his left hand, he grabbed Mark's coat lapels.

"You aren't Holden Caulfield. 'Catcher in the Rye' is not your goddamned manifesto." He squeezed with his right hand and Mark's hand broke, the bones shattering like glass. He would never use the hand again. "You don't have the right to take a human life."

The gun came loose, and Adam squeezed it as well, felt the metal bend and fold like aluminum foil as Adam reduced it to junk.

"Go home," Adam said. He pushed his thoughts into Mark David Chapman's mind. "Go home and remember this night. And, for the rest of your life, don't you even think about hurting another living soul."

Chapman looked at him in fear and disbelief. Then he turned, his shattered hand still in his jacket pocket, and ran away into the night.

"Is he alright?" John Lennon asked.

Adam turned toward him. He shoved the metal ball that had once been a gun into his pocket. Then he smiled. "Yeah. He... he was just confused." Adam nodded. "My mom's a big fan. Have a good night."

Adam walked past John Lennon and Yoko Ono and continued up the street.

He stopped by a trash can and dropped the destroyed gun into it.

Pike fell into step beside him. "You okay?"

Adam shook his head. "He... he was going to kill John Lennon. I could hear his thoughts."

"Yes, he was."

"But... Pike? John Lennon died in like 2015 of a heart attack. My mom cried."

Pike nodded. "2016."

Adam stopped. "He didn't die tonight."

"No. He didn't."

"My mom went to the Beatles reunion concert in Madison Square Garden, August 18, 1991. She has the t-shirt." Adam pointed behind him. "Lennon signed it. So did Ringo Starr."

"Get on the bus, Adam," Pike said.

Adam looked up to see a bus pulling up to the stop. He turned and Pike was gone.

The bus door opened, and Adam got on.

The bored bus driver pointed at the coin slot beside his seat.

Adam panicked for a moment.

"Check your right front pocket," Pike said. He was smiling at Adam from a seat midway back.

People turned and looked at Pike, then turned back to whatever they had been doing.

Adam reached in his right front jeans pocket. Two quarters and a dime.

The sign on the coin slot said sixty cents. He dropped the coins in and walked back to sit beside Pike. The bus drove past The Dakota and turned right onto Central Park West heading south.

Pike smiled. "There are an infinite number of universes - don't question that, man. Just accept it. And, in this one? A man named Mark David Chapman had a run in with a mysterious stranger one night in 1980. The stranger crushed Chapman's hand. Because of that, Chapman didn't kill John Lennon as he had planned. The Beatles got back together, did a reunion concert, and put out two albums. Chapman died in obscurity in a mental hospital in 2020."

"So there are realities where Chapman succeeded?"

"Yeah, realities where you don't exist or where you don't become you. There's one thing I want you to understand, though. This reality? The one we're in? Adam, out of all the universes, this is the best one. And, it's because of you."

"This reality is the best one? Jesus, Pike. There's a crazy Church that's going to take over the world. People are being made into sex slaves, and worse."

Pike nodded. "A few months from when we are now? The entire population of Latigo Key Florida just disappears. The Church does that. But, listen to me, man. All this? It saves the world... and more."

Adam laughed. "So, saving John Lennon saves the world?"

Pike laughed and shook his head. "Naah, man. Honestly? Saving John Lennon was my idea. I just felt like the world was a better place for it. And, it doesn't have any negative repercussions. From my frame of reference? I can see all the outcomes, so I know what works out and what doesn't. I'd love to get you to do some other things. Stop the Manson family, for instance. I really dug Sharon Tate, man, and Manson's crew were assholes. But, some really horrible things are tangled up with what needs to happen. Some things, they just can't be fixed." Pike looked up. "This is our stop."

Adam got up and pulled the stop cable.

He stepped off the bus at West Broadway and Chambers Street.

Pike was waiting for him. He was looking at the skyline to the south.

Adam held out his arms. "So this is my purpose? Just fixing things in time?"

"Part of it," Pike said. He kept staring to the south. "You're a hero. You're also a philosopher. Some people call you a saint. For me? You're my friend." He laughed a little. "You're pretty much my godson."

"I don't... feel like any of those things, Pike. I don't feel like..."

"A god? A savior? Yeah, that's why you're going to get it right, kid."

Adam laughed. "I'm glad you have faith in me, I sure as hell don't."

Pike nodded. "That's because I've seen you when you're you, man." He smiled. "Just look at that view."

Adam looked up at the twin towers of the World Trade Center. "Pretty amazing. Mom took me to see it about ten years ago."

Pike smiled, his eyes far away. "Time to go back."

Adam nodded. "So when I go back, will I be off the cross?"

"No. I mean, not unless you want to miss what's coming. I mean you can skip forward if you want but..."

"Goddamn it, Pike! I came here because I thought it would get me off that fucking cross."

"I never said that, man. You asked me how to get out of there, and I showed you. Now, you need to go back so you can see this through. So, strip."

"What?!" Adam looked around - there was a crowd here even at this late hour.

"You can't go back wearing clothes - you were bare assed naked when you left, you want to explain to the redheaded goddess how you ended up wearing clothes from 1980?"

"This place is full of people!"

"Yeah, so face the wall when you strip. Any guy who sees that python hanging down to your knees is going to feel inadequate for the rest of his life. Women are going to mentally compare their husbands and boyfriends to that dingus. That could alter the timeline, man."

Adam turned toward the bus stop wall. "I hate you, Pike."

Pike just laughed as Adam stripped.

People started yelling. Some cheered.

Then two cops came running.

"Better concentrate on when you were," Pike said.

Then they both disappeared.

***

Stallion's Adult Video

Level 10

Now

Adam opened his eyes. He was hanging on the cross on Level 10, the IVs back in his arm and side, his mental powers gone once again.

Pike was gone as well.

***

Sugar stood in Demona's lab. "He's not human?"

"He's based on a human. He was created from human DNA - three sets. Three transformed humans."

Sugar stared at her. "Wait... what?!"

Demona laughed. "Yeah, thought that would get your attention. His father and both of his mothers are transformed. I recognized the markers. Three immortals produced Adam Price."

"But... we can't reproduce," Sugar said.

"No, no... we are modified so we don't reproduce. The sterilizer, the slutifier, and the ovary freezing - that's why we don't reproduce, Boobs. But, that's immaterial - Adam was created from transformed DNA in a test tube, then he was implanted in a uterus. And, that uterus belonged to a transformed female. And, baby, it only gets weirder from there!"

Sugar looked down at Courtney who was leaning back in her lab chair.

Courtney shook her head. "She's very excited."

"Yes, I can see that," Sugar said.

"From what I've been able to gather from our reluctant demigod out there? He felt perfectly normal until he was exposed to something Monday morning. Something was applied to his hand." Demona pointed her tablet at a monitor on the wall. A line chart appeared. "That is what I found in a tissue sample I took from his hand."

Sugar stared at the screen. "Uh... a graph?"

Demona rolled her eyes. "That is a spectrographic analysis of Ambrosia. But, not just any old Ambrosia, oh no. That, my dear is pure, uncut Ambrosia. We can't even make that in the laboratory."

"I've never heard of that," Sugar said. "I thought Ambrosia came from transformed breast milk and cum..."

"It does. The low quality kind. This stuff is high test." Demona sat down. "Listen, a few months ago? I never told any of you this: the Demon Goddess Lilith invited me down to Havana for a night..."

Sugar's mouth dropped open. "I'm sorry, what?!"

"Yeah, yeah, I know. She didn't want me talking about it. Lilith's gorgeous. Tall, dark, four boobs. We had one hell of a fucking orgy... but that part's not important right now..."

"Sounds pretty important to me," Courtney laughed.

"Shh! Anyway, she told me a story about Morpheus. She told me his origin story." She pointed at the graph on the monitor. "Back when Morpheus was human in the 60s? He was exposed to pure Ambrosia as part of a government experiment. They tried it on a lot of people. The pure shit either gave everyone super powers which killed them, or they exploded outright, burnt to a crisp, one guy opened a dimensional doorway with his mind and ceased to exist - only Morpheus survived intact. Then, there was a period while he was..." Demona stared at the wall. "He had friends... and they became the first... transformed coven." Demona's brow knitted, and she appeared to be deep in thought.

"Demona?" Sugar said.

"Hmm?"

"You stopped in mid-thought."

She sat down in her chair. "Yeah, Boobs, I do that sometimes. When I'm thinking."

Sugar shook her head. "Okay, but Adam was born transformed. So, exposing him to the Ambrosia shouldn't have done anything."

Demona smiled and then laughed. "My thoughts exactly. Then I looked into his genetic structure a little more closely. The pure Ambrosia acted as a trigger for sort of a second puberty. His weak mind control powers became supercharged. Then, our two White Witches visit him, and, what do they do? They throw Ambrosia laden breast milk in his face. He swallows some. Boom! More changes. Suddenly he's got a monster cock and even stronger mental powers."

Sugar began to pace. "We need to let Maria know what's going on."

"We've got bigger problems," Demona said. "Sugar, he's still transforming."

"Transforming into... what?"

***

Candy and Bubbles sat in Bubbles' room in the Alpha Omicron Phi house.

Bubbles looked at the vial of white liquid. "This is really magic cum?"

Candy nodded. "It made me remember who I was, and it made me realize I had been brainwashed."

Bubbles shook her head. "I remember who I was."

Candy shrugged. "Then it should only make you understand the brainwashing part."

"So, it really is wrong to transform people against their will?"

"Yep."

She handed the vial back to Candy. "Don't want it."

Candy frowned. "I need your help. It's a Top Secret mission."

"You should see Dr. Love after she started believing that forcing someone to become transformed is wrong. She's a basket case. And, I lost my job because of it!"

"Would you stop whining about your stupid job?! Adam is in danger, and he's like the most important person ever."

Bubbles gritted her teeth. "I liked my stupid job! I got to flirt with freshmen, and I got to fuck the cute ones!"

"But..."

"No! I won't."

Candy burst into tears. "I failed! Lisa and Mikaela trusted me, and I failed. And, now Adam is going to die and it's all my fault."

Bubbles frowned at her. "Don't cry. I hate it when people cry."

"I'm too dumb to do this alone!"

"You aren't dumb, Candy," Bubbles soothed. She pulled the blonde close and kissed her. "I think you're super brave, and you were smart to ask me to help." She opened the vial and drank it down. She wrinkled her nose. "Yuck. Cold spoo is nasty."

Candy stared at her. "You did it!"

Bubbles nodded. "Yeah... wow, you're right. It is wrong to transform people against their will."

"Told you..."

Bubbles looked angry. "Hey! They cloned me when they transformed me! They made a clone of me and sent it back home in my place. Those assholes! No wonder I haven't been home in a whole year! They made me forget all about that."

"See? Some of the things the Church does are pure evil," Candy said. "Can we go save Adam now?"

Bubbles smiled. "Yes."

Candy grinned. "I have a plan. But, first? We have to go shopping."

***

Sister Asmodea stepped into the elevator on Level 3 and pressed the button for Level 10.

Nothing happened.

"SlutzNet? Why can't I go to Level 10?"

The AI spoke through the elevator speaker. "I'm afraid access to Level 10 is restricted for non-Whore Caste personnel."

"Since when?" Asmodea asked.

"Since this morning. By order of Mistress Sugar Tits."

She pulled out her cellphone. "Sugar? Why am I locked out of Level 10?"

"Demona is conducting some experiments that are very sensitive. She needs solitude," Sugar said.

"You've never locked me out before..."

"Asmodea, I'm sorry, but we're really busy. I'll talk to you later." She hung up.

"What the fuck?!"

***

Bubbles and Candy Kisses sat outside Stallion's in Bubbles' VW Beetle. Candy's legs were cramped even though her seat was pushed all the way back - she was a foot taller than the Cheerleader Whore.

"I don't think these disguises are going to work," Bubbles said.

"Why not?"

They had gone directly from Bubbles' apartment to a costume store downtown.

"Because ninjas attack at night," Bubbles said.

The two of them were wearing black ninja outfits complete with cowls and masks. The fit was... irregular.

Bubbles' G cup breasts threatened to cause a catastrophic failure of the cheap fabric.

In Candy Kisses' case, her J cups were not just threatening to burst free, but actually had. It had been impossible to corral the Street Whore's assets, so they had improvised by safety pinning the fabric together just below her breasts and creating the world's first low cut ninja costume.

Candy shrugged. "The main thing is? They won't recognize us. And, if we're stealthy? They might not even see us."

"That's stupid," Bubbles said. "You look like an X-Rated Thanksgiving balloon in the Macy's parade."

Candy pouted. "I think I look menacing."

"Yeah, let me do the thinking. I'm the smart one."

"Okay, let's go," Candy said.

"Wait. We can't go in the front. Rita the Bimbot will get suspicious if two ninjas walk in. We'll go through the loading dock..."

***

Stallion's Adult Video

Level 9

Ray lifted the huge steel door and hung it on hinges anchored into the bedrock with two foot long bolts. "There... much better than the simple gate we had before."

Ray and Rita were standing at the far end of the arched stone bridge. The orange glow of the lava field below lit the cavern in sinister hues. Beyond the door lay the tunnel that Demonica and her 'children' had used to escape Level 9.

"Place gives me the creeps," Ray said as he began installing the electronic lock on the door.

Rita walked up behind him and slid her robot hand into the front of his sweat pants. "We could make this into our little love nest."

Ray laughed. "You think this place is romantic?"

"I think," she said as she began stroking his thick cock. "Anyplace where we are alone? Is romantic."

He kissed her, his tongue sliding past her latex lips and into her mouth. Her mouth was warm and wet with artificial saliva. He pulled her close. Rita's body went limp in his arms, even though she could break him in half if she wanted.

She was content to let him hold her.

Ray marveled at how something so beautiful could be so dangerous, and he thanked whatever gods there might be that she loved him.

She broke the kiss abruptly and frowned.

"Something wrong?"

She turned her head a little to the side. "Not sure. I'm monitoring the security cameras." She looked perplexed. "Bubbles Bennett and Candy Kisses are on the ground level near the loading dock."

"So?"

"They're wearing ninja outfits," Rita laughed.

"Ninjas?" Ray laughed. "Must be some kind of new sex game."