Read Technosis: The Kensington Virus for Free Online

his shoulders, approached the table. “Dr. Baxter. I’m Dr. Gottfried. Can you understand what I’m saying?”
    Jamie began to speak, but felt his throat thick and sore.
    “Just nod your head if you understand me,” Dr. Gottfried said.
    Jamie nodded his head.
    “Very good. You’ve been under our care for the last 36 hours. When you get up you will find yourself feeling a little…different. Please avoid sudden movements,” Dr. Gottfried advised.
    Two med techs appeared at either side of the table and the table started to tilt forward. Jamie felt his body start to take the weight and was surprised to find he wasn’t sick or dizzy. Extended periods of immobility, especially medically induced immobility, usually resulted in nausea and vertigo when the body was first returned to an upright position. Instead his body seemed to welcome the change of position. The med techs released his straps and Jamie felt the weight of his own body settle into his legs. His legs were, when he looked down, not the atrophied limbs he remembered from before. They were thick and muscular like they’d been when he was studying to be a physician. He also felt muscles in his abdomen that he’d never felt before.
    “It was not a full reset,” Dr. Gottfried explained. “We were given very little time and told not to alter your physiological functions… fundamentally. So we were not able to do a telomere reset, nor would they let us clear the lipofucian, or enhance your glial cells. We did promote a little phagocytosis and made a few tweaks. But mostly it was steroids, metabolic accelerators and old fashioned Russian muscle units.”
    Jamie reached along the length of his torso and felt, for the first time in two decades, his ribs, with strong, lean muscles that he’d never experienced before. Then he thought about the steroids and looked down.
    “No worries there,” Dr. Gottfried observed. “They’ve not shrunken to the size of a peanut. We’ve managed the antagonistic aspect of the protocol so that your normal hormonal level will be maintained at a slightly younger stage. All to do with the DHEA and the subordinate hormones. Of course you understand all of this.”
    “Not entirely,” Jamie said, walking a few paces and then stopping to do a single legged squat. “Why did they do this?”
    “They limited us because of your natural gift or ‘resistance’; as to why they had you go through this, I can only say that you are twelve hours from in-field deployment,” Dr. Gottfried informed him. “And when I said no sudden movement, I meant it. You need to learn your new body. If you push it too hard without stretching you may injure it and that would not be acceptable. A significant investment has been made in you.”
    “Sir?” Said a man in a uniform, stopping just inside the operating room door.
    “Sergeant Rosen, I would like you to meet Dr. Jamie Baxter. The general has attached him to your group. He’s just completed his training and will be working with you on your next few missions,” Dr. Gottfried said.
    “Yes, sir.” The sergeant saluted and Jamie was placed in a robe.
    ∞
    Jamie was standing in a cinderblock locker room putting on a uniform with Sergeant Rosen at his side. “What?” Jamie asked.
    “I’ve got two rules,” Rosen said. “They are the only two rules. If you get these down we will get along fine.”
    “Okay,” Jamie agreed. “What are the two rules?”
    “Rule number one, don’t get me killed,” Rosen began.
    “And rule number two?” Jamie asked.
    “Never forget rule number one,” Rosen said.
    “Fine, I won’t,” Jamie agreed.
    “Have you been out among the KV?”
    “Besides in the health campus psych unit or when a general stuck me in a room with 12 of them and made me wear a pair of net specs?” Jamie asked.
    Rosen looked at him. “I thought that was some sort of macho bullshit from command.”
    Jamie shook his head. “Sink or swim.”
    “It explains the