The Parasite

November 2006. Lake Wildwood California

It's been raining for two months. Garrett Valdison has been typing up material he wrote in 1994 about the superior workability of free enterprise Capitalism. At the moment he is enjoying a fine breakfast of apple sausage, blackberries, and caramel yogurt with pecans. In spite of this culinary splendor, the incessant gloomy weather is beginning to interfere with his mood.

The rain is depressing, plus the fact that his old friend Zach Edwards back in Massachusetts is dying of cancer brought on by fifteen years of cocaine use. You can't nag someone and remain friends, so Garrett has kept to a policy of updating Zach every time he hears any new bad things about the drug. This way when the cocaine finally does it's work, Garrett knows that at least he will have a clear conscience.

Also worrisome is the fact that Garrett has noticed a problem with his vision lately resembling the after-image effect normal from bright light, and has finally decided to go see Dr. Amberson, a good eye doctor in Grass Valley.

December 6, 2006

After extensive tests Amberson diagnoses probable optic nerve necrosis from a enzyme-secreting pituitary tumor pressing on the optic chiasm, and refers Garrett to a specialist in Sacramento.

Garrett is appalled by the fact that even with his life at stake he has to deal with non-English-speaking problems in talking with the secretary of an eminent neurosurgeon. He expresses this perhaps too openly for his own good. The secretary now develops a bitter, sullen lack of responsiveness with a vicious edge to her voice.

All this puts Garrett into a dark contemplative phase. He wonders just what such a tumor can be to have such an agenda of invading cortical tissue while secreting enzymes to modify metabolism and behavior. What if this protuberance were kept alive in a plasma solution reproducing the host's chemistry? What might it grow into if nourished with the latest non hormonal growth stimulants?

December 9, 2006

Garrett contacts pathologist Dr. Erhardt Von Haptel, an old family friend in Germany, and requests help in pursuing this project of constructive medical research augmented by morbid curiosity.

December 16, 2006

Garrett calls Zach Edwards. Their conversation is strange. Zach is able to converse intelligently with Garrett, but is also reacting to bizarre hallucinations from the massive doses of morphine the doctors have given him. Garrett knows this will be the last time they will talk and tells Zach goodbye. Garrett has a healthy cry lasting about one minute and then gets on with his own troubles.

December 19, 2006

On the way back from his monthly trip to Reno, Garrett is doing about ninety mph in the legendary "Bullet Car", his lead colored Eagle Talon Turbo, down through a steep pass in the High Sierra. Suddenly an apparition of Zach flies out of the forest to the right, flattens against the windshield, looks at Garrett, and then flies off to the left. Not a vision, but a visually illustrated thought. With a strong appreciation of the possible significance of this, Garrett notes that the time is 4:10 PM.

December 20, 2006

Zach's girlfriend Margaret calls to tell Garrett that Zach died yesterday. Garrett asks the time. She says 1:00 PM her time - ten minutes before the apparition. Garrett tells her about it, hoping that it will help with her grief.

April 23, 2007

There has been a three month medical delay which nearly costs Garrett his life because of cortical edema. The delay was caused by the deliberate withholding of information by the neurosurgeon's secretary and other professional apathy at many levels. Garrett finally has his surgery in Sacramento. The tumor is given to Dr. Von Haptel who has flown over from Germany and rented a small house in Grass Valley. He has hired helpers, and in a specially constructed laboratory, proceeds with the project.

As Garrett expected, the observable phylogeny of the developing organism, which Von Haptel now calls the "parasite", begins to recapitulate the evolutionary process just as with a human fetus. The growth rate is accelerated almost twenty times by Von Haptel's nutrient solution. But it does have such a pale and sickly look. Time passes.

February 2, 2008

The parasite has grown into a mature man in mockery of Garrett, an inferior, unwholesome, moribund-looking clone of the original. The arms and legs are thin and spindly. The chest and shoulders hollow. The complexion is opaque and bluish. The areas around it's bloodshot eyes are blackened as if by bruising. The gums are red and swollen.

The creature seems manifestly evil and stares intently at anyone who approaches. It has a vicious look of all-consuming envy and hatred. It moves very little and never speaks. The creature has strong powers of auto suggestion. Von Haptel doesn't understand this when he finds himself suddenly driven to invite Garrett over to view the progress.

Garrett arrives and is taken very much aghast by viewing this nemesis and dire enemy for the first time. The creature glares at him in a way that makes Garrett reach for his pistol.

Von Haptel raises his hands in protest, "I can only imagine how you must feel, but please don't cheat humanity of such a discovery. I'm only beginning to understand this phenomenon. With the right medical team on this, we may learn to cure everything that goes wrong with health. This is the ultimate dichotomy, like good and evil, the very essence of health and illness itself. We are very fortunate to be able to pursue such research. There are many in the world who, for religious reasons, would deny us the liberty to do so."

Garrett reluctantly agrees and heads home, but problems ensue.

The next night Garrett nearly cuts off his fingers while he's slicing vegetables for lamb stew. It's almost like he wanted to do it and somehow stopped himself at the last second.

Two nights after this he nearly doesn't make it back from a kinky scenario with a very dangerous woman who was recommended to him by imprudent Hell-raiser friends quite some time ago. Just what is it that could suddenly make him decide to visit, and then foolishly relinquish so much control, to such a deadly female?

Garrett suspects outside influence and calls Von Haptel before heading over to the laboratory. The minute he enters he feels a strong urge to approach the parasite. He naturally mistrusts this impulse and advances carefully. The creature gives Garrett a very sour look and then with surprising ferocity tries to attack by furiously stabbing with a butter knife through the turkey wire enclosure. Von Haptel stuns the creature with an electric jolt.

February 14, 2008

The parasite, using telepathy, tricks the night orderly into releasing him and then kills him by strangulation. He then escapes in the orderly's clothes and automobile, drives to Sacramento and gets a newspaper. He reads about a big luncheon for stewardesses. In need of a little nookie, he decides to join the ladies.

Apparently the parasite isn't as puny as he looks, because he manages to lock the ladies into the banquet room and rape seventy three of them in ten minutes. When the police arrive he bellows savagely and throws chairs. Several police officers shoot him. It takes thirty four bullets to bring him down. The final shots effectively tear off his head.

Police, from eye witness accounts, later describe the parasite to news media as resembling a "robotically mobile steam-driven piston pump mercilessly raping woman after woman as they screamed and tried to fight him off."

The next day Garrett and the doctor meet at the laboratory. For "further forensic study" says Von Haptel. He wants to take a tissue sample back to Germany and start the whole project all over again with better security.

"Forget it, Herr Dr. Frankenstein. I agree with you about the liberty to pursue research, but consider the liberty of the seventy three women who were raped. There's too much unpredictability here. Remember, that creature was the evil part of me, and it's up to all of us individually to stop that part of ourselves. I don't want the responsibility of what else might happen if this research were to continue with my tissue sample." Von Haptel looks dismayed.

"Don't fret. As a pathologist you can get plenty of tumor samples and without the help of Burke and Hare" says Garrett. Next he makes makes two phone calls. Later that night the creature's body goes up in flames at the city morgue crematorium.

May 21, 2008. Reno Nevada

With a controversial news article on terrorism, Garrett begins his career as an impromptu journalist. Because Valdison is pro-active about world peace he looks with disdain upon most of humanity. Says Garrett "The average person on Earth is merely a sleepwalker living is a fantasy world of drugs, mythology, sports, and virtual reality." His journalistic impulse proceeds from a desire to change this tepid and limp wristed approach to living through education.