6 Degrees of separation
By Dany Dagenais
SMASHWORDS EDITION
* * * * *
PUBLISHED BY:
Dany Dagenais on Smashwords
6 Degrees of separation
Copyright © 2010 by Dany Dagenais
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
Smashwords Edition License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.
* * * * *
6 Degrees of separation
The sphere entered the atmosphere and ignited, but there was no danger, she had been conceived to be practically indestructible.
Lying on the hood of his car, Andy was smoking a cigarette and observing the starry vault when he noticed the sphere rip across the sky. Thinking it was a falling star, he made a wish, he wanted to be rich.
Had he known what was about to happen, he would have realized the futility of his wish.
3:05 a.m.
The sphere went through James’ hotel room bay window, bounced on the floor and implanted itself in the wall. James had paid for the high end room. Therefore, only Jamie (the escort whom he’d hired due to her resemblance to Elle Macpherson) and himself were awoken by the infernal racket while the hotel’s remaining residents remained oblivious to the event.
James got up, slipped on a robe, provided by the hotel, and headed towards the source of the noise. Jamie told him to be careful as she watched him walk away. He crossed the corridor looking suspiciously around him and entered the small lounge where fresh air was coming in through the smashed window.
Upon observing the damages to the room, he was able to determine the sphere’s trajectory and discover the place in the wall where it had landed. He slowly approached it, careful not to step on a piece of glass. He bent down, put one knee on the ground and studied the object at close range.
The sphere was entirely smooth, without any scratches, bumps or crevasses left by the impact. The metallic surface was slightly pink, cooling off from its journey through the atmosphere.
James, unaware of the sphere’s origin, was simply curious and did not want to touch the surface that seemed as soft as Jamie’s skin. He approached his hand slowly, feeling the emanating warmth. For a moment he hesitated, trying to figure out of what this object reminded him. Unable to find anything, he decided it might not be a good idea to put his fingers on this mysterious object. It could be a bomb. It could also simply be a plane part that broke off during flight.
Though sceptical, he eventually decided to touch the sphere. At that same moment, Jamie shouted: “What’s going on James?”
James jumped up, fell on his ass and began laughing, feeling stupid. He took a deep breath and said: “Nothing. Actually, it’s not nothing. I think a piece of a plane just landed in our room.
-What?”
He heard the sheets crinkle, signalling that Jamie wished to see for herself what was going on. James decided it was fine time to verify the smoothness of the sphere and then he could compare it to Jamie’s behind shortly afterwards.
Within a fraction of a second, the sphere’ smooth surface opened and let out a pointy object, held by a flexible little arm, that landed right between James’ eyes. He yelped, more out of shock than pain. His shout was short lived but sufficient enough to stop Jamie dead in her tracks. The sphere had moved itself from the wall, pulled by the flexible arm, it went over James’ head, landing on the base of the skull, behind the head, to the brain’s place. Thousands of little holes appeared on the sphere’s smooth surface, letting tiny wires emerge and wrap themselve around James’ brain. Unconciously, James gave over control of his brain. He was essentially dead.
The extraterrestrial sphere, however, would make good use of it. The wires finished connecting and the computer started to rummage through the knowledge, the memories, the abilities and senses formerly belonging to James. In just a few seconds, he had determined his mission’s next step: Joan Berg, who lived a 4-hour car ride away from the place where he was. It was time to hit the road.
Jamie, coming out of her stupor, entered the room just asJames got back on his feet. She was practically naked, wearing only a thong. She didn’t notice anything changed in her lover, not seeing the sphere shoved into the back of his head.
“James, are you all right?”
The stranger did not answer her question as it was learning more through James’ knowledge on the human body’s fragility. Fast as lightening, the man grabbed the prostitute by her long hair provoking in her a scream of terror. She was pulled through the broken glass which cut her satin flesh. James’ feet were also cut up pretty badly, but the pain translated only information to the computer and did nothing to impede his mission. Jamie cried and begged for him to let her go. Crossing the balcony, her screams doubled in intensity as she anticipated the event that would follow.
A few seconds later, Jamie’s body ripped through the roof of a limousine parked in front of the hotel. The impact killed the driver instantly and made the backseat, occupied by a movie star and his entourage, errupt in screams.
3:12 a.m.
Taking advantage of the commotion surrounding Jamie’s deadly fall, the sphere, disguised in James’ body slipped back inside the hotel. She climbed into a car and away from the gaping mop trying to catch a better glimpse of the naked woman’s corpse. The vehicle drove off at full speed, crushing its owner and seriously injuring 7 other pedestrians before disappearing at the next intersection.
4:30 a.m.
The computer in James head went back to 2:15 minutes the estimated time before he met Joan Berg. All four departure times had been calculated according to James' parameters, which never exceeded the speed limits and allowed for traffic. However, the sphere pushed the car to its maximum without putting the vehicle’s mechanism in danger. In a short while, she would be in contact with Joan.
The headlights of a police car appeared in the rear-view mirror as a siren signalled its approach. The sphere scanned James’ brain and concluded that the police was pulling him over for speeding. It slowed down and stopped the car on the side of the road.
The policeman searched for a long time in the computer’s data before getting out of the car. He took out his weapon and came precociously close to the stolen car trying not to lose sight of James. He gave the order:
«Sir, raise your hands through the window so I can ensure that you are not armed.»
James’s body obeyed, giving his trust to the policeman who grabbed the handcuffs tied to his belt and came close to the car. He put his weapon away and installed the bracelets around James wrists.
The two handcuffed hands suddenly grabbed the policeman’s right arm and pulled him with the inhuman strength. The policeman fainted due to the impact of the car roof against his head. But James smash head against car a second time, a third time, and a fourth time. When the blood started to leak out of the roof of the car, he stopped beating the cop, knowing very well that he was dead.
With a screech, James got back on the road, leaving a corpse in the middle of the road lit up by the headlights of his car.