Doctor Shigeko Tokage smiled as she affectionately rubbed under the chin of her Axolotl salamander.
"Today you will make history, my little friend, " said Shigeko in her native Japanese tongue. "We both will."
Shigeko removed her hand from the aquarium and dried it on a towel. The Axolotl followed her, expecting a treat. Shigeko desperately wanted to reward her little pet, but she could not risk any outside interference that might alter the desired result of her experiment. She made a mental note to give him a nice treat after the trial was complete.
Shigeko walked up to the big glass window of her laboratory, a small room in a moderately-sized skyscraper that served as a subsidiary for Horizon Labs in Japan. The city of Tokyo spread out below her. It was a crowded but beautiful city. A city that would be made famous, too, after today if she was successful.
Despite the intense efforts of the employees of Horizon Labs, the Dinotopia Project had not made much progress. There simply was not enough intact preserved DNA for a complete genome of any dinosaur. The only success had been the lizard monster known as Heather currently residing in the United States. But how the virus had been able to combine the fragments of DNA from different dinosaurs into a functional genome capable of uplifting was still a mystery.
The virus had not been able to reproduce the same outcome in any other living organism that had been infected with it. Typically, the virus remained inert, doing nothing or simply being rejected by its new host. Occasionally, it did have an effect, but the results were not pretty. The virus acted almost like a cancer, causing random body parts to change and grow in unpredictable ways, typically in a manner that was not conducive to the survival of the host. The resulting abomination would invariably die given enough time, usually in a very messy and painful way.
It was still unknown why the virus had affected Heather differently. The predominant theory was that some innate genetic abnormality had allowed the virus to successfully integrate into her genome. Others postulated that something in her genetic ancestry had helped her body to endure and survive the arduous transformation process. Some had even suggested that Heather had never been human, but instead was a dinosaur that had somehow survived extinction and was later uplifted by the Animalian virus.
Shigeko knew this was ridiculous. Heather's genome had been completed sequenced, and it was obvious that an odd mixture of different dinosaur genes had been incorporated into her human genome.
After spending some time studying the problem, Shigeko developed an interesting theory and possible solution to the problem. She believed that the reason the test subjects kept dying was because the cells in their bodies could not keep up the pace demanded by the virus for their rapidly developing bodies. The cells lacked the ability to quickly divide, grow and regenerate, most likely because they had terminally differentiated. So why not use an animal who was known for its ability to rapidly regenerate, one whose whole body was practically composed of stem cells? Only an animal such as that could survive the rigorous demands of the transformation process.
An animal like the Axolotl salamander.
Shigeko received little support. One of the tenets of the Animalian virus was that it could not be used to uplift one species of animal to another. It could only uplift an animal to a human or a human to an animal. The Chimera Project had not yet produced results, at least none that she was aware of. But Shigeko was sure that the pluripotent ability of the Axolotl's cells would allow the virus to succeed where it failed with other animals. And at least one person at the main office of Horizon Labs in America had agreed with her. They had shipped a sample of the virus circulating in the Heather lizard's body to her laboratory in Japan at great expense.
Shigeko nervously removed the syringe containing the virus from its case. She reached her hand into the aquarium and gently grabbed hold of the Axolotl. It did not resist. She had been working with the salamander for some time and it was accustomed to her touch. It almost seemed to enjoy it.
"Now, this will hurt for just a minute, " said Shigeko as she plunged the syringe into the Axolotl.
It squirmed angrily in her hand as she finished the injection. It swam off her hand after she was finished. It almost looked like he was giving her a dirty look, angry that Shigeko had betrayed their trust and treated him so cruelly.
Shigeko carefully watched the Axolotl for any changes. At first nothing seemed to happen. Shigeko was afraid it would be another failure, another one of the many test subjects in which the virus had no effect.
Then the Axolotl slowly began to get bigger.
Shigeko reserved her excitement. Several test subjects had initially been affected in a similar way. The true test was if they could survive the complete transformation process. The Axolotl shook its hands, wiggling its digits as they began to change, getting shorter and gaining dexterity. It also shook its enlarging head as it seemed to examine its changing hands.
Could it be thinking? thought Shigeko with excitement. That was a sure sign of progress. Almost none of the test subjects had shown any cognitive development.
Shigeko loudly cursed as she realized in her excitement she had forgotten to turn on the digital camera. She wanted ... no, she needed to record all of this. She turned around to flip it on. By the time Shigeko had turned back around, the Axolotl had grown even larger. It was rapidly getting too big for its aquarium. Shigeko rushed over to pick it up and move it to the larger aquarium she had prepared in advance.
Shigeko reached into the aquarium and placed her hand under the Axolotl. The texture of its skin was surprising. It was not soft and slimy like she expected. Instead, it had the hard, rough texture of a reptile. Shigeko could feel the creature expanding in her hands. It was now the size of a small cat and just as heavy. She had difficulty lifting it out of the aquarium. She saws its mouth open and close rapidly, almost in a panicked state.
Had it lost the ability to breathe underwater? thought Shigeko in a panic.
Shigeko desperately and ineffectively tried to lift the creature out of the water. It was now the size of a dog. Its' body stretched across the whole length of the aquarium, its' body pressed against the glass. Shigeko dropped the creature and ran to her desk. She had no choice. She would have to break the aquarium to free it, or to at least insure it could breathe. She cursed again as she searched through her messy desk drawer looking for something heavy she could use to smash the glass.
The sound of breaking glass startled her. Shigeko turned around and saw that the creature had freed itself. Or rather, its expanding body had broken apart the aquarium as it had outgrown the confines of its enclosure. The creature was the size of a small child and still growing. It struggled to stand - on two feet! It wiggled the fingers of its hands. It looked at her with pleading eyes.
"H... Help..... help me," it said.
Shigeko could barely contain her excitement. Her experiment was a success! The creature had been successfully uplifted with the virus from the Heather dinosaur. It didn't look exactly like a dinosaur, but it was darn close. Its' skin had a leathery texture and it had the same clawed hands and feet. Its' tail was long, with odd fan-shaped spikes poking out along it. The external gills had hardened into a structure that looked more like a horn or a spine. And she could see small pointy teeth in its mouth.
"Yes, come here. It's okay. I will help you, " said Shigeko, encouraging her pet to come forward.
As it got closer, Shigeko began to get concerned. It continued to grow as it walked, soon reaching and surpassing her short stature. Worse, she saw a large erect phallus poking out. Too late she remembered another tenet of the Animalian virus - infected subjects were often incredibly aroused! The Axolotl hugged her tightly, pressing its enlarging penis against her.
"Help me, " it moaned as it rubbed against her, trying to find relief from its burning desire. "Help me!"
"No, no, get away," said Shigeko as she pushed against it. As the creature continued to grow bigger, the tip of its penis moved further up her body, till it was just inches from her face. She could see the pink organ pulse and twitch. She knew it was close to release. She tried to push it away, but it was too late. Possibly spurred by the touch of her gentle hands the creature's dick exploded, drenching Shigeko in what felt like gallons of semen. Disgusted and gagging, Shigeko slipped out of the creature's grasp, spitting the foul solution out of her mouth.
The creature did not seem to notice. It grabbed at its head in pain as it continued to get even larger. Its' body began to grow unevenly. Its' head bulged obscenely, as well as one of its arms. With a loud pop its arm exploded, showering Shigeko with gore. Its head followed soon after, splashing its brains as well as other viscera across the room like paint and wet gelatin. Its' body fell to the ground, still twitching. Then it fell silent. There was no sign of growth, no sign of movement .....
..... no sign of life.
Shigeko loudly cursed as she turned off the camera. Her experiment had been a failure, her project apparently a waste of time. She wiped off the mixture of semen and damaged tissue off her body with a towel. She surveyed the mess made by her error.
It would take all day to clean up the mess!
Shigeko could not trust the janitorial staff to safely decontaminate the room and handle the biohazardous material. It was her responsibility. And her shame. She did not want anyone to see her failure. She considered destroying the tape and hiding all the evidence. But the main office would want some kind of results, especially after the sacrifice they had made to give her a sample of the virus.
As Shigeko finished cleaning herself and began to cleanse her lab, she tried to think of way to put a positive spin on this disaster.