De Novo (The Gene Thief Series Book 1 - Short Story) Read Online Free PDF Page A
Author: Jason Cole
three drops of blood. Her eyes were fixated on the red liquid diluting itself, fading into the blue. She inverted the vial a few times to speed up the process, and then she took out her pipette. She pipetted 250 microliters on a glass slide and turned her camera on.
She placed the slide down on top of a small table. It appeared to be carved out of a stump, with the skin of an animal stretched over the top.
Taking her camera, she stared at the screen on the back and zoomed in on the droplet. She waited for it to scan and initiate itself. Once it sensed DNA within the view, the green button would light up and processing could begin.
As she waited, her mind wandered again, thinking back to the message update. Wondering what kind of person was waiting for this gene. Were they good people? Rich or poor? These were the usual questions she filtered through. The same questions she knew would never get answers to.
Beep, beep.
The camera notified her it was ready to begin flash sequencing. She pressed the green button and the scanning began. She walked away from the tripod, and sat down on a stool in the side of the hut.
Her eyes were fixated on the shaman. The massive headdress made of colorful flowers, big green leaves, all held together with a sort of fibrous string. It was majestic, and she admired these sorts of people. They had their own world here. So unadulterated and pure. At least she knew when she was done, he would have no recollection, and they could continue on as if nothing ever happened.
Chapter 7
Blinking rapidly, Kira was fighting her way through a dense mental fog. As her vision struggled to gain focus, she realized how the hut was now filled with smoke. What she had thought was incense when she walked in was some sort of medicinal or hallucinogenic type plant that the shaman must have lit. The room was one big wavy image and the colors were screaming at her. It hurt to even look.
She glanced down at the camera and noticed it finalized.
Process complete.
The only good thing she had going for her right now was that the shaman was still lying on the ground motionless
She looked down at her hands just a couple inches from her face and realized how bad the situation was getting. The outlines of her fingers which separated them from environment were fading. Her world was beginning to fade seamlessly into her surroundings, no longer feeling distinct and separate. Amidst all of the chaos and confusion, there was a subtle serenity and peacefulness to it. For a brief moment she felt part of something, an integral part to the world and not a forgotten outcast.
She hit finalize on the camera and the nucleotides began to appear on the screen. The sequence was being saved and isolated from the genome. Once this process was complete, she could take this back to her room, perform the chemical cleavage in her room and deliver the isolated gene. Mission accomplished. Not so bad after all, assuming she could make it out of this place in one piece.
All of a sudden, the colors were dimming; total darkness was encroaching, consuming her. The colors faded quickly, and her consciousness even quicker.
She knew she had a few more seconds to get out of this hut or risk passing out and being discovered. One could only imagine what a tribe of people would do if they saw their shaman lying unconscious on the floor and a stranger in the room.
Grabbing her gear, she stuffed her things back into the bags, fumbling around like a drunk, and staggered back towards the entrance. She pulled the cloth open a couple of inches and squinted out at the village. As if the village wasn’t impressive before, now it looked like it was flying in midair. The hallucinogens were setting in, the effects growing stronger and stronger.
Kira was now experiencing a complete sensational overload. Each nerve bombarded with more external stimuli than it could process. The rain was deafening, the colors once vibrant were now dead, and she knew time was
She placed the slide down on top of a small table. It appeared to be carved out of a stump, with the skin of an animal stretched over the top.
Taking her camera, she stared at the screen on the back and zoomed in on the droplet. She waited for it to scan and initiate itself. Once it sensed DNA within the view, the green button would light up and processing could begin.
As she waited, her mind wandered again, thinking back to the message update. Wondering what kind of person was waiting for this gene. Were they good people? Rich or poor? These were the usual questions she filtered through. The same questions she knew would never get answers to.
Beep, beep.
The camera notified her it was ready to begin flash sequencing. She pressed the green button and the scanning began. She walked away from the tripod, and sat down on a stool in the side of the hut.
Her eyes were fixated on the shaman. The massive headdress made of colorful flowers, big green leaves, all held together with a sort of fibrous string. It was majestic, and she admired these sorts of people. They had their own world here. So unadulterated and pure. At least she knew when she was done, he would have no recollection, and they could continue on as if nothing ever happened.
Chapter 7
Blinking rapidly, Kira was fighting her way through a dense mental fog. As her vision struggled to gain focus, she realized how the hut was now filled with smoke. What she had thought was incense when she walked in was some sort of medicinal or hallucinogenic type plant that the shaman must have lit. The room was one big wavy image and the colors were screaming at her. It hurt to even look.
She glanced down at the camera and noticed it finalized.
Process complete.
The only good thing she had going for her right now was that the shaman was still lying on the ground motionless
She looked down at her hands just a couple inches from her face and realized how bad the situation was getting. The outlines of her fingers which separated them from environment were fading. Her world was beginning to fade seamlessly into her surroundings, no longer feeling distinct and separate. Amidst all of the chaos and confusion, there was a subtle serenity and peacefulness to it. For a brief moment she felt part of something, an integral part to the world and not a forgotten outcast.
She hit finalize on the camera and the nucleotides began to appear on the screen. The sequence was being saved and isolated from the genome. Once this process was complete, she could take this back to her room, perform the chemical cleavage in her room and deliver the isolated gene. Mission accomplished. Not so bad after all, assuming she could make it out of this place in one piece.
All of a sudden, the colors were dimming; total darkness was encroaching, consuming her. The colors faded quickly, and her consciousness even quicker.
She knew she had a few more seconds to get out of this hut or risk passing out and being discovered. One could only imagine what a tribe of people would do if they saw their shaman lying unconscious on the floor and a stranger in the room.
Grabbing her gear, she stuffed her things back into the bags, fumbling around like a drunk, and staggered back towards the entrance. She pulled the cloth open a couple of inches and squinted out at the village. As if the village wasn’t impressive before, now it looked like it was flying in midair. The hallucinogens were setting in, the effects growing stronger and stronger.
Kira was now experiencing a complete sensational overload. Each nerve bombarded with more external stimuli than it could process. The rain was deafening, the colors once vibrant were now dead, and she knew time was
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