Canvas - Part 2
"Luthor," Eric repeated. "as in the LuthorCorp Luthors ?"
The tall man smiled and replied, "The very ones."
"What do you have to do with this?" Eric asked.
"Oh," Lionel said gesturing to the room at large, "all this belongs to LuthorCorp. A, um, relative convinced me of the feasibility of purchasing a top rate lab. Cadmus is at the leading edge of DNA research. A criterion that fortunately the government was looking for when they were trying to find somewhere to house you. One research proposal later, well..here you are."
"Glad I could be of assistance," Eric replied sarcastically.
Lionel smiled at this. "I know you don't feel that you've been treated very well since you've been here, Eric, but let me assure you, this is much better than a prison cell. You don't have any roommates here looking to, say..'hook up.' And I also assure you, the competition for this project had quiet a few proposals that prominently featured the term 'dissection.'"
Eric swallowed involuntarily at the word "dissection" and unconsciously lowered his eyes.
"I believe, " Lionel continued, "that you can be of a great deal more use than that. If Dr. Stephens' theory is correct you could potentially be anything you wanted. Think about it Eric, DNA that can take on any properties you want and give you any abilities you desire."
Lionel stepped forward toward Eric capturing his eyes again.
"Your usefulness would be immeasurable. You wouldn't be a freak anymore, Eric. You'd be a hero. Someone everyone else desires to be. Isn't that what you wanted all along?"
Eric held Lionel's eyes for a second and then asked, "What do I have to do?"
"Not a great deal, Eric. You'll have to undergo a little medical procedure first. Purely to assure your safety, of course," Lionel hastened to add, "then we'll proceed with the template experiment."
"What type of medical procedure?"
"Oh, we just need to hook up some monitoring and safety devices. Nothing overly large or cumbersome. They're just some things that we need to make sure the experiment stays under our control. The entire procedure will take less than 30 minutes and then after about an hour or so recovery time from the anesthesia we can proceed."
"You'll be perfectly safe, Eric." Dr. Stephens added before turning toward the orderly and saying, "Brian, take Eric into the OR and get him stra..situated on the operating table. The other staff is already waiting and I'll be in shortly."
Without a word Brian, as Eric now knew his guard's name, took Eric's arm and began directing him toward the OR. At a loss for any other action, Eric cooperated.
"How soon may we begin, doctor?" Lionel asked.
"Just as you told him, within two hours we can proceed with phase two of the experiment."
"And the safeguards you'll be installing?"
"I'm sure they'll be more than adequate, Mr. Luthor."
"You'd better be, doctor. I don't deal well with incompetence and more than one of my projects has failed because someone got overconfident. This one had better be a qualified success. Or else."
Lionel had leaned slightly forward as he spoke, his eyes burrowing into Dr. Stephens', using his superior height to force the scientist to look up as he backed away slightly. When Stephens swallowed and looked away Lionel smiled in satisfaction.
"You'd better hurry along, doctor. Destiny awaits."
*********************************************
When Eric awoke he was in a different part of the lab. He tried to rise up, but quickly discovered that he was restrained to the bed on which he was laying.
"Ah, Eric. You're awake," said Dr. Stephens as he stepped into view. "How are you feeling?"
'OK, I guess, " Eric replied looking around. "What exactly did you do to me? I don't see any monitors attached to me."
"That's not the kind of safety equipment we implanted, Eric," Lionel said startling Eric as he approached the bed from the other side.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, Eric, let's be honest. You're asking us to give you a great deal of power and then just trust that you'll use it appropriately once you have it. I'm afraid trust is one of those things I never really developed. I prefer to have assurances, so that's what we have installed. Assurances."
"I actually don't remember asking you to do anything and I'm not real sure I like the sound of the word 'assurances.'" Eric replied.
"Come now, Eric. For a short time you had incredible power. People respected you. Are you telling me you don't want that again?"
"I don't think 'respect' was the operative word and I still want to know about these 'assurances'."
"Don't be naïve. Fear is the sincerest form of respect. People are fickle. If they willingly give respect they can just as willingly take it away. Fear is a power unto itself. As long as you stir that fear you command their respect. It's no longer something they give, but something you take!"
Lionel's eyes had taken on a maniacal gleam as he spoke and Eric began to understand what he was talking about because he was starting to feel a great deal of fear of Lionel at this moment. He was silent for a moment after Lionel quit speaking and then asked again, "What did you do to me?"
Lionel leaned forward putting his face near Eric's.
"We implanted a tracking device and some explosives," he said matter of factly.
'What?!" Eric screamed.
"What did you think, Eric? I would give you the power of a god and not have some means of controlling you? You really are naïve. The next stage of this experiment will determine whether or not your DNA can mimic another's abilities. Should this work then the following and final stage will be an attempt to return you to your former strength and abilities. I'm not doing this for the glory of science, Eric. I'm doing this for the benefit of having someone with those abilities at my beck and call. That won't work if I can't force that person to respond now will it?"
"I'll explain this simply. There is a tracking device and an explosive device, both with redundant systems, placed in your body. I will know where you are at all times. If you try to escape, the explosive will be triggered. If you disobey me, the explosive will be triggered. If you fail to behave in the appropriate manner, the explosive will be triggered. If I in any way do not feel that you are cooperating, the explosive will be triggered. Are you starting to see a trend here?"
Eric nodded his head slowly as he digested this new development.
"For over a year now you have been a failed experiment. It's been suggested on numerous occasions that at this point we could probably learn more from dissecting you than from continuing to spend good money after bad. If this works, though, I will make you rich beyond your wildest dreams. You'll live in luxury and all I ask is that you perform a few small favors for me from time to time. Many of which I'm sure you'll even enjoy doing. That sounds like a fair trade doesn't it?"
Beginning to feel resigned Eric simply asked, "What's next?"
"That's the spirit, Eric." Lionel said smiling and moving back from the bed. "As I said earlier, stage two is where I come in. Cadmus has a great deal of knowledge and resources, but nothing they could really use to test Dr. Stephens' theory in a practical manner. Certainly they could have used any old DNA that was lying around, but I didn't really see the need to turn you into a dog or cat or some other pet."
Eric's eyes widened slightly as he began to understand the ramifications that Lionel was talking about.
"I have certain resources, however, that Cadmus lacks. Resources that will allow a test, while not risking any gross deformities that the introduction of an animal's DNA may cause. "
Lionel gestured to Brian who had come to stand by Eric's bed and he began to undo the restraints.
"These resources should allow you to return to your former glory, Eric. And we'll all work hard together to make sure that we don't repeat past mistakes."
Once the restraints were removed Eric was pulled to his feet and directed to follow Lionel as he continued talking.
"I know that things did not go well with your parents in the past, Eric, but we'll soon sit down with them and explain how you have just become the next step in humanity's evolution."
Eric nodded numbly as he was led into a room with several large pieces of equipment including another bed with restraints, only this one looked vaguely like something out of a science Fiction story and was connected to an even larger apparatus.
Dr. Stephens approached the workstation and began to study the controls while Brian led Eric to the bed and began strapping him down. Once this had been accomplished the entire bed was tilted forward so that Eric was now in an upright position.
"We're almost ready to begin, Eric. Just relax," Dr. Stephens said.
Stepping forward Lionel placed his hands on either side of Eric's face and said, "Just think about it, Eric. If this works you'll be a blank canvas just waiting for me to paint a masterpiece onto your very being. Someone that will make the very world tremble."
"But we still don't know what my genes mimicked to begin with, Mr. Luthor. How am I going to regain my powers if I don't even know what I got them from."
Lionel smiled briefly and replied, "All in good time, Eric. All in good time. For right now let's just see how good a theoretical scientist Dr. Stephens is."
Stepping back Lionel moved aside and Eric noticed for the first time that a little girl had entered the room and approached him. She took his hand without a word and simply stared at him curiously.
"For now," Lionel repeated placing a bar of what appeared to be pure meteor rock in Eric's other hand, "let's just see if you can be everything that this little girl is."
"I don't understand. What am I supposed to mimic about her?" Eric said beginning to feel slightly fearful.
"Let's just say that she's a bit more than she appears to be," was Lionel's only answer.
Dr. Stephens interrupted at that point.
"Now Eric," he began, "this is going to be slightly different than the other experiments. In the past we used low level electricity just to see how your cells reacted. However, now we are working on the assumption that your cells aren't reacting to the electricity, but rather the electricity is simply the source that powers your cells' ability to change. As such, we're going to have to use a much higher power setting than we have in the past."
"How much higher?"
"Well, since we're not exactly sure how much is needed to initiate a transformation we'll use the equivalent of a lightning bolt just to be on the safe side and duplicate the original conditions."
"A lightning bolt?!" Eric screamed, "But, but what if your theory is wrong?"
"As they say, Eric," Lionel said with a smirk, "can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs. If all else fails, at least there is still the dissection clause in the original research proposal."
Turning to Stephens he said, "You may begin, Doctor."
End Part 2
"Luthor," Eric repeated. "as in the LuthorCorp Luthors ?"
The tall man smiled and replied, "The very ones."
"What do you have to do with this?" Eric asked.
"Oh," Lionel said gesturing to the room at large, "all this belongs to LuthorCorp. A, um, relative convinced me of the feasibility of purchasing a top rate lab. Cadmus is at the leading edge of DNA research. A criterion that fortunately the government was looking for when they were trying to find somewhere to house you. One research proposal later, well..here you are."
"Glad I could be of assistance," Eric replied sarcastically.
Lionel smiled at this. "I know you don't feel that you've been treated very well since you've been here, Eric, but let me assure you, this is much better than a prison cell. You don't have any roommates here looking to, say..'hook up.' And I also assure you, the competition for this project had quiet a few proposals that prominently featured the term 'dissection.'"
Eric swallowed involuntarily at the word "dissection" and unconsciously lowered his eyes.
"I believe, " Lionel continued, "that you can be of a great deal more use than that. If Dr. Stephens' theory is correct you could potentially be anything you wanted. Think about it Eric, DNA that can take on any properties you want and give you any abilities you desire."
Lionel stepped forward toward Eric capturing his eyes again.
"Your usefulness would be immeasurable. You wouldn't be a freak anymore, Eric. You'd be a hero. Someone everyone else desires to be. Isn't that what you wanted all along?"
Eric held Lionel's eyes for a second and then asked, "What do I have to do?"
"Not a great deal, Eric. You'll have to undergo a little medical procedure first. Purely to assure your safety, of course," Lionel hastened to add, "then we'll proceed with the template experiment."
"What type of medical procedure?"
"Oh, we just need to hook up some monitoring and safety devices. Nothing overly large or cumbersome. They're just some things that we need to make sure the experiment stays under our control. The entire procedure will take less than 30 minutes and then after about an hour or so recovery time from the anesthesia we can proceed."
"You'll be perfectly safe, Eric." Dr. Stephens added before turning toward the orderly and saying, "Brian, take Eric into the OR and get him stra..situated on the operating table. The other staff is already waiting and I'll be in shortly."
Without a word Brian, as Eric now knew his guard's name, took Eric's arm and began directing him toward the OR. At a loss for any other action, Eric cooperated.
"How soon may we begin, doctor?" Lionel asked.
"Just as you told him, within two hours we can proceed with phase two of the experiment."
"And the safeguards you'll be installing?"
"I'm sure they'll be more than adequate, Mr. Luthor."
"You'd better be, doctor. I don't deal well with incompetence and more than one of my projects has failed because someone got overconfident. This one had better be a qualified success. Or else."
Lionel had leaned slightly forward as he spoke, his eyes burrowing into Dr. Stephens', using his superior height to force the scientist to look up as he backed away slightly. When Stephens swallowed and looked away Lionel smiled in satisfaction.
"You'd better hurry along, doctor. Destiny awaits."
*********************************************
When Eric awoke he was in a different part of the lab. He tried to rise up, but quickly discovered that he was restrained to the bed on which he was laying.
"Ah, Eric. You're awake," said Dr. Stephens as he stepped into view. "How are you feeling?"
'OK, I guess, " Eric replied looking around. "What exactly did you do to me? I don't see any monitors attached to me."
"That's not the kind of safety equipment we implanted, Eric," Lionel said startling Eric as he approached the bed from the other side.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, Eric, let's be honest. You're asking us to give you a great deal of power and then just trust that you'll use it appropriately once you have it. I'm afraid trust is one of those things I never really developed. I prefer to have assurances, so that's what we have installed. Assurances."
"I actually don't remember asking you to do anything and I'm not real sure I like the sound of the word 'assurances.'" Eric replied.
"Come now, Eric. For a short time you had incredible power. People respected you. Are you telling me you don't want that again?"
"I don't think 'respect' was the operative word and I still want to know about these 'assurances'."
"Don't be naïve. Fear is the sincerest form of respect. People are fickle. If they willingly give respect they can just as willingly take it away. Fear is a power unto itself. As long as you stir that fear you command their respect. It's no longer something they give, but something you take!"
Lionel's eyes had taken on a maniacal gleam as he spoke and Eric began to understand what he was talking about because he was starting to feel a great deal of fear of Lionel at this moment. He was silent for a moment after Lionel quit speaking and then asked again, "What did you do to me?"
Lionel leaned forward putting his face near Eric's.
"We implanted a tracking device and some explosives," he said matter of factly.
'What?!" Eric screamed.
"What did you think, Eric? I would give you the power of a god and not have some means of controlling you? You really are naïve. The next stage of this experiment will determine whether or not your DNA can mimic another's abilities. Should this work then the following and final stage will be an attempt to return you to your former strength and abilities. I'm not doing this for the glory of science, Eric. I'm doing this for the benefit of having someone with those abilities at my beck and call. That won't work if I can't force that person to respond now will it?"
"I'll explain this simply. There is a tracking device and an explosive device, both with redundant systems, placed in your body. I will know where you are at all times. If you try to escape, the explosive will be triggered. If you disobey me, the explosive will be triggered. If you fail to behave in the appropriate manner, the explosive will be triggered. If I in any way do not feel that you are cooperating, the explosive will be triggered. Are you starting to see a trend here?"
Eric nodded his head slowly as he digested this new development.
"For over a year now you have been a failed experiment. It's been suggested on numerous occasions that at this point we could probably learn more from dissecting you than from continuing to spend good money after bad. If this works, though, I will make you rich beyond your wildest dreams. You'll live in luxury and all I ask is that you perform a few small favors for me from time to time. Many of which I'm sure you'll even enjoy doing. That sounds like a fair trade doesn't it?"
Beginning to feel resigned Eric simply asked, "What's next?"
"That's the spirit, Eric." Lionel said smiling and moving back from the bed. "As I said earlier, stage two is where I come in. Cadmus has a great deal of knowledge and resources, but nothing they could really use to test Dr. Stephens' theory in a practical manner. Certainly they could have used any old DNA that was lying around, but I didn't really see the need to turn you into a dog or cat or some other pet."
Eric's eyes widened slightly as he began to understand the ramifications that Lionel was talking about.
"I have certain resources, however, that Cadmus lacks. Resources that will allow a test, while not risking any gross deformities that the introduction of an animal's DNA may cause. "
Lionel gestured to Brian who had come to stand by Eric's bed and he began to undo the restraints.
"These resources should allow you to return to your former glory, Eric. And we'll all work hard together to make sure that we don't repeat past mistakes."
Once the restraints were removed Eric was pulled to his feet and directed to follow Lionel as he continued talking.
"I know that things did not go well with your parents in the past, Eric, but we'll soon sit down with them and explain how you have just become the next step in humanity's evolution."
Eric nodded numbly as he was led into a room with several large pieces of equipment including another bed with restraints, only this one looked vaguely like something out of a science Fiction story and was connected to an even larger apparatus.
Dr. Stephens approached the workstation and began to study the controls while Brian led Eric to the bed and began strapping him down. Once this had been accomplished the entire bed was tilted forward so that Eric was now in an upright position.
"We're almost ready to begin, Eric. Just relax," Dr. Stephens said.
Stepping forward Lionel placed his hands on either side of Eric's face and said, "Just think about it, Eric. If this works you'll be a blank canvas just waiting for me to paint a masterpiece onto your very being. Someone that will make the very world tremble."
"But we still don't know what my genes mimicked to begin with, Mr. Luthor. How am I going to regain my powers if I don't even know what I got them from."
Lionel smiled briefly and replied, "All in good time, Eric. All in good time. For right now let's just see how good a theoretical scientist Dr. Stephens is."
Stepping back Lionel moved aside and Eric noticed for the first time that a little girl had entered the room and approached him. She took his hand without a word and simply stared at him curiously.
"For now," Lionel repeated placing a bar of what appeared to be pure meteor rock in Eric's other hand, "let's just see if you can be everything that this little girl is."
"I don't understand. What am I supposed to mimic about her?" Eric said beginning to feel slightly fearful.
"Let's just say that she's a bit more than she appears to be," was Lionel's only answer.
Dr. Stephens interrupted at that point.
"Now Eric," he began, "this is going to be slightly different than the other experiments. In the past we used low level electricity just to see how your cells reacted. However, now we are working on the assumption that your cells aren't reacting to the electricity, but rather the electricity is simply the source that powers your cells' ability to change. As such, we're going to have to use a much higher power setting than we have in the past."
"How much higher?"
"Well, since we're not exactly sure how much is needed to initiate a transformation we'll use the equivalent of a lightning bolt just to be on the safe side and duplicate the original conditions."
"A lightning bolt?!" Eric screamed, "But, but what if your theory is wrong?"
"As they say, Eric," Lionel said with a smirk, "can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs. If all else fails, at least there is still the dissection clause in the original research proposal."
Turning to Stephens he said, "You may begin, Doctor."
End Part 2