Transformations: Morpheus Ch. 02

The tumbler was full of dark liquid. "Shh, I'll be fine. All of it?"

She nodded.

I drank it down.

It tasted like fruit juice. I couldn't quite place it, like a mixture of pomegranate and orange juice with a hint of anise and alcohol.

She stared into my eyes. "Anything?"

I looked left and right. Then I crossed my eyes, "I feel fine."

"Don't make fun!"

I laughed. "Relax, I don't feel a thing."

She nodded. "I'll give Pike his dose. Lie down."

"I will. Hey, I'm okay, Melody."

She tried to smile and slid open the curtain. "Okay, Mr. Pike, it's your turn."

"Yeah, man! Let the good times roll!"

***

I suppose avalanches start that way, mud slides, rockslides. Eerie calm. Calm before a storm.

I was lying in my bed looking at Melody Hutchins as she leaned against the wall by the door. The more I looked at her, the prettier she appeared. I imagined I could read her mind. She was thinking about what our children would look like.

I smiled and she smiled.

Calm. Just calm.

Then people were running in the hall. I could hear screams. People were yelling things like "Stat!" and "Code blue!"

Melody turned and looked at the door like she was terrified of it.

"Oh, fuck, man," Pike said.

Melody had left the curtain open and I looked over at him.

He had re-lit his joint, but it was smoldering in the ashtray beside him. He was staring at his fingers. "It's... all... yeah," he mumbled.

"You okay, Pike?" I asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I just... I found the door."

"The door? What door, Mr. Pike?" Melody asked.

"Wait, wait. It's sitting out there in twelve dimensional space. It's all... yeah... shit, man. It's all connected. Man, we're like, so limited here, you know?" He stood up. He scratched his head and rubbed his shaggy beard. "It's like we're in three dimensions with the fourth being time, but we're just cramped here. But I can open the door, man."

"Mr. Pike, sit down," Melody asked.

The commotion in the hall grew even louder.

"I'm just going to open it and take a peek, okay? I'll come right back."

"Pike? Don't do that!" I yelled. I don't know why I yelled. I just had this sudden image of a door leading to nothing. Absolute, utter nothing. And I could see Pike's hand on the knob.

"Just one little peek." Pike turned sideways.

And then he disappeared.

I screamed out loud. "God, I'm tripping out! He disappeared! I saw him disappear!"

Melody stared at me wide eyed and shook her head. "You're... not hallucinating. He's gone. He's just gone."

***

Melody and I huddled in the corner and stared at the spot Pike had disappeared through his twelfth dimension door.

"Maybe he'll come back," Melody whispered after about ten minutes.

"He can't."

"Why?"

"Because he stepped into nothing and the door closed behind him."

"How do you know that?" She asked as she clung to me on the floor.

"I... I could see what he saw for a moment. I could see farther. I knew what was on the other side of his door. I think he could've too if he hadn't been so fucking stoned."

She shook me. "Don't open any doors! You hear me?"

"I... no. I won't. I... look I could see what he was thinking, but I couldn't really understand it. Pike was some kind of theoretical mathematician. I'm an artist, math isn't my thing."

"How could he do that, Eric?"

"Somehow he figured it out in his head and made it real."

"That's insane," she whispered. "Please don't do anything like that."

The door opened.

Dr. Thompson walked in with Stafford. Thompson looked pale.

Stafford looked like... Stafford.

"Where's Mr. Pike?" Thompson asked.

"Twelfth dimension," I said.

"What?" Stafford asked.

"He... solved some kind of equation in his head and opened a door to another dimension. What the fuck did you give us, you prick?" I got to my feet.

"Why isn't he weird?" Stafford asked.

"The fuck is that supposed to mean?" I asked.

"Eric, please calm down," Thompson said.

Melody was holding my hand.

"Calm down?! My roommate just teleported to the fucking Twilight Zone. Don't tell me to calm down!"

I could see the hallway behind Thompson and Stafford. Balenger was supervising a nurse who was mopping up a huge round puddle of blood. "Fuck me," I whispered.

A redheaded nurse came in with wide eyes. "Dr. Thompson, she's burning again."

"What the fuck is going on?!" I yelled.

"Nurse Hutchins, we need a sedative," Thompson said.

Melody just stared at him.

"Nurse Hutchins! A sedative. Now, please?"

Melody let go of my hand and ran out the door. "Yes, doctor."

"Wait, for me? I'm not taking a fucking sedative."

Thompson held out his hands. "Eric, please, calm down. Listen to me. We need you to relax."

"Relax? Are you nuts?"

"You survived, Eric. But it's not over yet. You need to relax and calm down. It's for your own good. Trust me."

"I survived? What the fuck?!" I stared at him. "Jesus. You knew what this shit would do..."

"Eric, you don't understand everything that's at stake here. Okay? Just, please trust me. I need you to sleep for a few hours."

"How many of us survived, Thompson?"

Thompson sighed. "Three. One girl keeps catching fire, we keep putting her out, but she just ignites again. One young man is comatose. And, then there's you."

Melody came back in with a syringe.

"How many dead or just gone like Pike?" I asked.

Thompson swallowed. "Seventeen."

Melody took my arm.

"No. Don't do that," I said.

"I'll be right here. I won't leave you."

"Please let her, Eric," Thompson said.

I looked in Melody's eyes. "I trust you."

She smiled weakly and put the needle against my arm.

***

I was walking through darkness, but I wasn't alone.

Behind me, I could hear the footsteps of others echoing off the walls.

Was I in a tunnel?

"Naah, man, the tunnel's a metaphor," Pike said.

I almost stumbled. "Pike?"

He appeared in front of me smiling in his tie-dye. The tunnel was pitch black, but Pike was brightly lit as he floated in the air a few feet in front of me.

"In the incorporeal flesh, man."

"You're back?"

He scratched his beard. "Not exactly. I'm no more real for you than a painting or a TV show."

"What?"

"Umm, art terms... let me think... you're not educated enough, yet. It's like when you paint some naked chick? You're projecting her three-dimensional image onto a two-dimensional canvas. Comprende?"

"Okay..."

"And now, you might want to touch the coochie you just painted, but if you touch the painting? You're just touching paint and canvas. You got to go and touch the real coochie in four-dimensional space. You know? Four dimensions? Length, width, depth, and time?"

"I understand."

"So, me, I'm in the twelfth dimension - I got all four of the lower dimensions and eight more of them." He winked. "Pike ain't here, man."

"Can you come back?"

He shook his hand. "Naah, man. I can project myself into your reality, though. I mean, you were right, there is literally nothing in dimension twelve but me. Luckily, my new enhanced noggin is still chugging, and I'm figuring all kinds of shit out. I can move on, I just can't move back."

"I'm sorry, Pike."

"Don't be, man. I'm going to unlock all the secrets of the universe. But I wanted to check on you first before I go exploring. How you doing, man?"

"Evidently walking through a dark place."

"At least you aren't alone. Shit, man, you got the whole world moving with you. Like some kind of god or something."

"Are they really following me, Pike?"

"Yeah, through dark places, Eric. Gonna get darker."

"You know what's going to happen?"

"Yeah, man. I see it all from out here in dimension twelve."

"Will you tell me what you see?"

Pike shook his head. "Can't, sorry. I'll change it if I do. I just came back to check on you and give you hope, brother. You're going to be okay, Eric." He nodded behind me. "So are they. I think it had to happen like this, man. Too much dark shit in the world. Too many evil men. You're like some kind of cosmic reset switch." He began to float away from me. "Just remember: some doors you go through? You can't go back. Good luck, Eric."

***

I woke up lying on my side in my hospital bed.

Melody had her back to me, bent over doing something.

I smiled. "Nice ass, Nurse Hutchins."

She straightened and turned around.

The woman wasn't Melody. She was middle-aged with long blonde, almost white hair. "Thank you," she said in a thick Russian accent. "However, I am not Nurse Hutchins."

"I... um... sorry."

"I am Nurse Marapova, Head Nurse Marapova. This is my floor." Her face was as inscrutable as the Sphynx.

"Where's Melody?"

"Sleeping. She stayed by your side for over twenty-four hours. I made her find a bed and get some sleep."

I was holding back laughter.

She raised an eyebrow. "Something is funny?"

"I'm sorry. I... have you ever seen Bullwinkle?"

"What is Bullwinkle?"

"A cartoon."

"Cartoons are for children. Like Flintstones."

"Well, Bullwinkle is a moose and he has this friend named Rocky who's a flying squirrel? And they're constantly being pursued by these two secret agents, Boris and Natasha..."

"Why would secret agents pursue moose and squirrel?"

I burst out laughing when she said, 'Moose and Squeer-ul'. "I... don't know why they're following them."

"Again, you are laughing."

"You sound exactly like Natasha."

"And this makes you laugh?" She frowned. She put the back of her hand against my forehead. "How are you feeling this morning? You have no fever."

"I'm fine. Thank you."

She took a step back, her face still in the icy frown. "You are a ridiculous man. Stop harassing my nurse."

I nodded. "Yeah, I will."

"Doctor will be in shortly," she turned to leave.

"Nurse Marapova, the other survivors?"

She paused in mid-step. "You are only survivor," she said without turning around. Then she walked out and closed the door.

***

"I'm going to sue you, you son-of-a-bitch," I said through clenched teeth.

Thompson stood by my bed and let me rant.

Stafford stood behind him with a smug expression. "Had to be this one who made it? Goddamn it."

"You're fucking monsters! You knew what this shit would do."

Stafford laughed. "I had Green Berets not survive it. Research scientists didn't. Nobel laureates died screaming." He shook his head. "Who survives? A goddamned junkie artist from Berkeley who thinks with his dick. No morals, no guts, no brains. You gave Ambrosia to this motherfucker and he survives?"

"Colonel!" Thompson said.

"Fucking waste."

I chuckled. "I'm going to the Press. Cronkite, Huntley and Brinkley? They're all going to be saying your names for the next year. Oh, man, when they get finished with you..."

Stafford laughed. "You pissant. I snap my fingers and you get a one way ticket to a hot LZ in Viet Nam. Better yet, we'll take you out on a Huey past the fifty mile mark and drop you in the goddamned Pacific. How good a swimmer are you? Huh?"

"Colonel! That's enough! Wait for me outside," Dr. Thompson said.

"You don't tell me..."

Thompson spun around and Stafford, though much taller, backed up. "You are going to do precisely what I tell you, or you can explain to LBJ how you fucked up the most important experiment in human history. I would not like to be you during that dressing down, Colonel."

Stafford clenched his fists.

But he walked out the door.

Thompson turned back to me, the harsh expression gone from his face. "I'm sorry about that, Eric. Stafford is not a bad man..."

"You're all bad men! Jesus Christ, you just killed nineteen people, Thompson!"

Thompson sighed and sat down in the small chair beside my bed. "Yes. And before that the experiment I killed two dozen others."

"Why? You're not a bad person, Dr. Thompson. I can see..." Looking at him, I could tell the deaths weighed heavily on him.

I paused. How could I tell that? Somehow, I knew. Somehow, I knew Dr. Allen Thompson was a good and decent man who grew up in Topeka, Kansas...

I shrank back from him, horrified by what I had done.

"What's wrong, Eric?"

"I... nothing I..." How could I tell him I had somehow seen into his mind? Read his thoughts? Seen that, though he was doing bad things, he was a good man?

What had they done to me?

"Eric, the previous attempts we made with Project Olympus? The participants knew exactly what they were getting into. They knew the risks. They were all sworn to secrecy. They chose to take Ambrosia of their own free will."

"Ambrosia?"

"The drug you took. It's called Ambrosia."

"And they all died?"

Thompson clasped his hands together. "Yes. A few just collapsed. Hearts gave out or their brain just stopped functioning, burnt itself out. Others? They developed powers that they couldn't control. One man turned to stone right in front of me - literally turned to stone, Eric."

"And you gave this to us, doctor? Without warning us?"

"Yes."

"In God's name, why?"

"There's a problem, Eric. It's a problem so complex that it will take us thousands of years to solve it. And that's only if we could get every nation on earth to devote all their resources to the solution, which we can't. Even if we did? We have less than two hundred years to solve it."

"I don't understand."

"The world is going to end, Eric. And we're not smart enough to fix it."

"What? Nuclear war? Pollution? Overpopulation?"

Thompson shook his head. "Smaller than that. Much smaller. But more devastating."

"What does this have to do with your super LSD? What did this have to do with nineteen college students, Thompson?"

"What do you know about the Greek Gods?"

I stared at him, perplexed. "I... don't know. You mean Zeus, Aphrodite, and Apollo?"

Thompson nodded. "Yes, the Greek Pantheon. Also the Egyptian gods, Ra and Anubis. The Norse had Odin and Thor. The Celts had Cu Chulain. The Babylonians had Gilgamesh."

"You're losing me."

"They were all real, Eric."

"What?"

Thompson smiled. "Thunderbolts from on high, chariots across the heavens. All of it was real. Long ago, farther back than recorded history. The accounts we read about now in classical history are just stories passed down. The gods were normal human beings who were exposed to a liquid that enhanced their abilities"

"Ambrosia," I said.

"Nectar of the gods. Five years ago we found clay vessels containing Ambrosia in a ruined temple near Athens. The United States has secured all of the Greek vessels."

"You're trying to create gods? Why?"

"Athena. The goddess of wisdom. We believe she was an ancient super genius created when a highly intelligent ancient Greek woman drank Ambrosia. We need someone with the wisdom of Athena, the intellect to solve this problem."

"That's why you gave us the IQ test?"

"Yes, and why you were one of the twenty we chose. Eric, your IQ is off the charts."

"So was Pike's..."

"Yes, and that's why I put you and Pike in the same room. I thought that at least one of you would make it. And you did."

"So did Pike."

Thompson frowned. "What?"

"I saw him in a vision last night. He's still there in the twelfth dimension. I thought it was a dream, but now I don't know."

"Can he come back?"

"He says he can't." I sighed. "Jesus, Thompson. All those people? You should have told us the risks."

"What would you have said, Eric?"

I looked at him. "I would have said no."

Thompson smiled and nodded. "The stakes are too high for a 'no' answer, Eric."

"Am I the only one who ever survived this, doctor?"

"Other than your multi-dimensional friend? Yes, Eric."

"So far so good then," I whispered.

He leaned forward in his chair. "Eric, I think you survived because you were the right combination of intellect and sensibility."

I laughed. "I don't think Stafford would agree."

"He thinks you're a drug addict. I know you're not - oh, you smoke a joint now and then, pop a pill or two at a party. But, for a hippie, you're pretty tame."

I shook my head.

"Eric, I think you have balance. A boundless intellect coupled with compassion. You're a realist but you have an artist's soul. Perhaps that's why the ancients believed in being a well rounded person whereas we've embraced specialization? The question now is: what gift did the Ambrosia leave in you?"

***

By 4:00 PM, I hadn't died, exploded, caught fire, turned to stone, or taken a one-way trip to another dimension.

Melody came into my room at shift change. "I'm sorry. Marapova wouldn't let me come in till it was my shift."

I was lying on my bed in blue pajamas. "They brought me pajamas. I look like Ward Cleaver."

"They're adorable," she said.

"I hate pajamas. I sleep naked."

She laughed. "Of course, you do." She walked over to me with a thermometer. "Open."

"What if I refuse?"

"We also have rectal thermometers, if you'd prefer?" She smiled.

I called her bluff. "Mmm, kinky. I like it."

She blushed crimson. "God, you're twisted. Open your mouth, weirdo."

She popped the thermometer under my tongue and took my wrist in her slim hand.

I grabbed her hand and held it.

"Eric! Stop! I have work to do."

But she was smiling.

She ran the fingers of her other hand through my hair. "How do you feel?"

"Mell, I hafn't 'sploded yeth," I murmured with the thermometer in my mouth.

She stared at me and then laughed. "Oh, you haven't exploded yet. Got it."

She took the thermometer out of my mouth. "99. A little fever."

"No, I've always been hot blooded." I winked at her.

"Jesus, do you ever turn it off?" She tried to pull away, but I pulled her onto the bed on top of me.

"Eric! Let me go," she said.

"Okay, I will." I let her go and put my hands over my head.

She stared at me.

I smiled at her. "Go on. I won't stop you."

She bit her lower lip. Then she rolled over and kissed me.

"Finally," I whispered. "I thought maybe you were a lesbian."

She closed her eyes. "God, I'm going to regret this."

"Oh, eventually, I'll guarantee it." I kissed her, pulling her tight against me, my hands caressing her hips and back as our tongues played.

I reached down and ran my hand up her nylons stopping with my hand under her dress. I ran my fingers over her stocking tops.

She raised up. "Stop."

"Why?"

"I'm on duty. Marapova is still at her desk. Thompson, Stafford, or Balenger could come and knock at any moment."

"Who cares if you're on duty? I'm your only patient. As for Marapova? Me and Natasha get along great. I complimented her on her ass this morning."

Her mouth dropped open. "You did what?

I laughed. "Relax. Mistaken identity. I woke up and she was bent over - the two of you have remarkably similar butts."

She laughed and lay back down. "Wait - did you call her Natasha?"

"Yeah, like Boris and Natasha from Bullwinkle."

She giggled and snuggled against me. "I know, she really is a blonde Natasha. Wait... You didn't tell her that, did you?"

"Yeah?"

"And you're still in one piece? She scares me to death. Evie, that's the other nurse? She says Maria was some kind of soldier in World War II - hero of the Soviet Union or something like that."

"No shit?"

"That's what Evie says. Anyway, Maria will be watching you 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM. I have you 4:00 PM to midnight. Evie has you overnight - oh, and Evie is a beautiful redhead."

"Oh, is she?" I laughed.

"Yes, and she will tell me if you make a pass at her. And you damned well better not. If I'm taking you as my lover? This belongs to me." She smiled and grabbed my cock through my pajamas.

Her smile went away, and she looked down at her hand.

I just smiled at her.

"Is that your...?"

"Mm, hmm," I said and nodded.

"Fuck," she whispered.

I kissed her cheek and whispered. "Told you I'd spoil you for all other men."