Resequencing DNA

The pair continued to sit and watch T.v together for another two hours before Wesley got up and headed to his bedroom, leaving Aaron to sit in the living room alone.

“What the fuck is he doing in there?” Aaron asked himself as he noticed three hours had passed by since his friend had disappeared into his room. “I knew he wanted to go into work this afternoon and he needed to get ready…but three fucking hours?”  he thought as he stood up and walked into the hallway.

“Hey…Wes…are you okay in there?” called Aaron before approaching the door to Wes’ room, yet there was no reply. As he stepped up to the door, he could hear Wesley mumbling to himself inside the room, yet couldn’t quite hear what it was he was saying.

“Hey, Wes…buddy…are you okay?” Aaron called out once more as he gently tapped on the door. At that, Wesley’s voice paused for a brief moment.

“Poor guy…the stress of family and then work…I think it’s getting to him…he’s in desperate need of a break,” thought Aaron.

“Hey…Aaron…yeah…I’m fine…I’m just erm…I’m just getting ready…thinking over some stuff you know,” Wesley replied from inside his room.

“Yeah…that’s fine…” stated Aaron, opening the door ajar and peeking inside. Inside he noticed Wesley, he was perched on the end of his bed, his arms propped up on his knees as his head rested in his hands. “I was erm…just wondering what time you needed to run into work…you know…it’s already like 4 pm…doesn’t the lab close soon?” he added, looking at his watch.

“Hmm…oh yeah…the lab…it closes at 5 pm… as long as I’m in there before then it won’t matter really…” replied Wesley.

“Okay…but don’t you think we should be on our way… like soon…just to be safe,” stated Aaron.

“Yeah…erm…sure…just to be safe…that makes sense, I’ll just grab my jacket and my lanyard and erm…yeah we’ll be on our way,” stated Wesley, although it was now clear to Aaron that Wesley was rather nervous about something. Even though Wesley suffered from terrible anxiety, the times Aaron had seen Wesley this bad previously could be counted on one hand, it was clear that something had triggered him, but what.

“Jesus Wes, calm the fuck down…is everything really that bad?”  Aaron thought, watching as Wesley grabbed his jacket along with his ID card that was hung by his bedroom door.

“Great…let’s go,” stated Wesley with a rather nervous smile.

Aaron grabbed his own jacket, slipping it on he made sure to check his car keys were in the pocket before the pair left the apartment and headed down in the lift to the car park. Once in the car park, the pair climbed into Aaron’s red, Ford Focus and began to make their way to Wesley’s place of work.

The journey was rather quiet and awkward, to begin with. Aaron continually tried to engage Wesley with small talk, whilst Wesley stared out of the window almost in complete silence, other than the single word answers he returned to Aaron. Realising that small talk was getting him nowhere and that the journey would take forever in silence, Aaron opted to switch on the radio, singing and nodding his head to the music as he drove.

 This certainly made the journey pass by much quicker, from Aaron’s perspective at least and before they knew it, they pulled up to the security gate at the outside of the laboratory.

A short, rather broad set gentleman stepped out of the small security hut to meet them. He looked to be in his late 40s early 50s, clearly balding other than the thin tuft of grey hair that went around the sides of his head. As he stepped out of the small hut he placed a black cap on his head as he approached the car, his black jacket had the word security emblazon on the right-hand side of his chest in white lettering.

Aaron rolled down the window as the man approached,

“Can I help you?” asked the security guard, in a voice that was way deeper than Aaron expected to hear.

“Hey, Frank,” said Wesley, waving to the man standing by the car window.

“Oh, Mr Ashton-Burns, how can I help you today? Aren’t you a little late for work?” asked the security guard that Wesley referred to as Frank as he chuckled.

“I have a couple of things to do in the lab, could you do me a favour and give my friend here a visitors badge, he’s been kind enough to run me here when I’d otherwise be unable to drive…if you know what I’m saying,” replied Wesley with a laugh as he mimed drinking out of a glass.

“Sure…any guest of yours, I guess we can trust Mr Ashton-Burns, sir, but remember he’s your responsibility,” answered Frank, pointing his finger at Wesley before returning to the hut. Frank returned to the car a few moments later with a lanyard in one hand and a clipboard in the other. “Here you go sir, “ he said, handing Aaron the clipboard with a pen attached. “I just require your ‘John Hancock’ here sir, followed by yours here Mr Ashton-Burns, sir,” he added pointing at the clipboard.

Aaron signed his signature in the box Frank had instructed before handing it to Wesley to sign his name.

“Now don’t you worry about the time in and time out Mr Ashton-Burns, I’ll fill those out for you don’t worry,” stated Frank as he took the clipboard from Aaron and handed him his visitor pass. “Enjoy your visit and stay outta trouble, you got that,” stated Frank with a smile and a chuckle.

“You got it,” replied Wesley as Frank returned to his hut before the gate began to raise, allowing Aaron to drive inside with Frank waving cheerfully as they passed by.

Once inside, Aaron pulled into the visitor's parking bay, the pair climbed out of the car and began to make their way across to the extremely large building.

As they entered, the first thing Aaron noticed was how incredibly white and sterile the interior of the place looked. The floor was covered in white tiles, whilst the walls were all painted pure white. In front of them as they entered was a huge desk with a computer and a telephone sitting upon it. Seated behind the desk was a young lady dressed in a black suit and white blouse, looking exceptionally professional, her blonde hair tied up in a bun atop of her head and her eyes were a piercing shade of blue, however, Aaron couldn’t help but notice her rather large breasts that looked like they were almost ready to burst out of her blouse. The white wall behind the desk had the words “Pinewood Genetics” on it in rather large letters, along with the company logo.

 The pair walked toward the desk where Wesley smiled at the young lady.

“Hello Wesley,” stated the young woman,

“Hey Beverly, how are you doing today?” replied Wesley.

“I’m fine, thank you,” she replied with a smile as Wesley pressed his thumb against an electronic device the lady held up to him.

“Glad to hear it,” replied Wesley with a nervous smile before he began to usher Aaron through a set of revolving glass doors and into a long corridor. Aaron quickly noticed that the building was clearly shutting down for the night as there was almost nobody else in sight.

“She was cute, why not ask her to the wedding with you, she’s about your age right?” asked Aaron, to which Wesley began to chuckle. “What’s so funny,” asked Aaron rather confused.

“You think she’s my age… she’s actually 48 years old Aaron, she’s married with a son the same age as my sister Pippa,” laughed Wesley, “Remember I said I’d trialled the resequencer on a woman yesterday…well…that was her,” he added with a chuckle.

“Holy shit dude,” exclaimed Aaron, “You told me you changed her…her boobs…her height, her hair colour…but you never mentioned her age what the fuck,” continued Aaron, “I bet her husband loves you guys…and I bet her son loves you, even more, having a mum that looks like she had him when she was fucking 2 years old or even his sister… what the fuck man.”

 “Actually…her husband is wanting a similar treatment,” Wesly laughed as he placed his palm on a console beside a door which opened as he did so.

“Welcome Mr Ashton-Burns,” said a computerised voice as the doors slid open and the pair stepped inside.

“Welcome to my office,” stated Wesley as he walked over behind a desk and sat down at a computer.

Aaron noticed that other than the desk, there was little else of note within the room, other than huge amounts of wires going from the computer to a huge tube that almost looked like a stand-up sunbed that was at least 8ft tall with a clear panel that looked like a door on the front of it.

“That must be the resequencydoohicky that Wes keeps talking about,” thought Aaron.

Wesley proceeded to hammer away at keys on the keyboard at the computer whilst mumbling to himself.

“Aha…yup…aha,” mumbled Wesley as Aaron walked over to the almost giant tube to get a closer look.

 “Hey…I might have to get you to make me younger one of these days,” laughed Aaron, “Maybe about your age…or maybe fuck it 18 again,” he joked but Wesley didn’t even crack a smile.

“Aha,” he simply replied, a look of pure concentration was written on his face. A few moments later, however, he finally looked up at Aaron who was looking at the technology.

“Hey Aaron…whilst you’re here… you might as well make yourself useful,” stated Wesley, a nervous tone was evident in his voice.

“Why so nervous Wes? Is something wrong with your machine?” thought Aaron. Instead, without letting his thoughts be known, Aaron replied, “Yeah what’s up man, something you genius science types need my help with,” he laughed.

“Absolutely,” replied Wesley somewhat sarcastically, once again without so much as a smile as he glanced up from the computer screen. “I’m getting an error message, I need you to check around inside the reqsequencer to make sure there is nothing loose or broken inside, can you do that for me?” Wesley asked.

“Sure I guess,” replied Aaron as Wesley prompted the door to open.

“It looks like a fucking pod from aliens or some shit, is an alien gonna jump out at me or something,” thought Aaron with a smirk on his face as he stepped in and began to look around.

Just then, Aaron heard the sound of the door closing behind him,

“WHAT THE FUCK!” he thought in panic. By the time he managed to turn around, the door was completely sealed shut and he couldn’t get out.

“WOAH MAN, WHAT THE FUCK, LET ME OUT!” screamed Aaron but to no avail, he could see Wesley hammering away at the keys.

“He must be trying to let me out…it must have malfunctioned,” thought Aaron.

Just then he could hear Wesley’s voice inside the chamber,

“Just…remain calm Aaron…everything will be okay,” stated Wesley. “I can’t hear you from out here…but just know this…your DNA has been backed up on file and I will put you back to normal…eventually. Please… understand…if I had told you…you probably wouldn’t have gone along with it…okay…I’m sorry…you won’t feel a thing and it’ll all be over soon.”

At that, Aaron heard the click of the microphone that Wesley had spoken to him on before the inside of the machine began to light up and make whirring noises.

“Holy Fuck man…what is he doing to me…that…that bastard,” thought Aaron as he began to feel lightheaded, his eyesight began to become somewhat fuzzy and his entire body began to tingle as if electricity was passing through every inch of him.