"Holy Ssssshit..." said Jack Morris in disbelief, examining his mouth closely. He had just been given a pair of long, deadly fangs and a forked tongue, courtesy of the program that his best friend, Patrick Graham, had up on his computer. The program, called the Chronivac, could, as the boys had found out, could alter things in the real world. They had also read that the program could alter reality to make it seem like the changes it made had always been, but they weren't ready to go that far just yet. "Dude, where did you get thisss thing?" Jack asked. Pat shrugged and said, "Believe it or not, I got it in the mail this morning."
"No ssshit?"
"No shit."
Earlier that day, Patrick had been watching TV in the living room when he had heard the doorbell ring. He muted the TV, left the room, and walked down the central hallway to the front door. He opened it and saw the postman standing on the other side. Patrick saw that the mailman was carrying a small box under his arm. "Can I help you?" Pat had asked. The mail carrier had looked at his clipboard and said, "I have a package for Patrick Graham?"
"That's me," Pat had said, "Where do I sign?" The postman gave him a slip. Pat signed it and handed it back to the postman. The latter handed Pat the box. "Thanks," Pat said. The mailman nodded and walked back to his truck. Patrick shut the door and walked down the hallway and headed up the stairs to the second floor, stopping in the kitchen on the way to grab a box cutter. When he reached the top, he had hung a right and traversed the remaining 5 feet to his bedroom. Upon entering it, he walked over to his desk against the wall across from the right side of his bed. Pat set the box down on the mahogany surface and sat in the black leather swivel chair that he had bought the previous month with some money that he had received for his birthday the previous year.
The 20-year-old used the box cutter to slice open the tape on top of the box. Pat put the sharp implement on the desk about a foot to the right of the package. He stretched, feeling his back crack in a couple of places, and opened the box. Inside, he saw a CD-ROM labeled in permanent marker, “C-vac 4.0”, a small device that looked like a webcam attached to a USB drive, an owner’s manual, and a piece of paper. He took the paper out of the box and unfolded it, wondering what the hell had shown up on his doorstep. It read:
Dear Mr. Graham,
You have been randomly selected by us at TransDem Laboratories, Inc., to beta test the latest version of the Chronivac. This program has the power to alter anything in the physical world and, if you wish it, make it reality. Be careful with it, however, as some changes may have unforeseen consequences. Also, make sure it doesn’t fall into the wrong hands. The last thing we need is for a terrorist or someone of a similar persuasion to have the power to make anything they wish reality. In conclusion, Have fun and use it wisely.
Sincerely,
Marcus Richter
TransDem Laboratories
“Holy shit,” Patrick had said, thinking about the implications of receiving this program. “I can play God with this thing…” He took the rest of the objects out of the box and set them on the desk next to the box cutter. He picked up the owner’s manual and opened it to the quick start guide. It said that he had to put the CD-ROM into the disc drive of his computer and follow the instructions from there. Pat put the box on the floor so that he could get at his desktop computer. He closed out of all the windows that were open so that they wouldn’t affect the installation in any way. Pat pushed a button on the tower CPU that opened his disc drive. He inserted the disc and pushed the disc tray back in. He heard the whirring of the processor as it registered the fact that there was a disc in the drive. After about 5 seconds a small dialog box popped up that said only one word: Install? He clicked the yes button and after about 15 seconds, the program was fully installed. “Is it just me or did that program install unnaturally fast?” It wasn’t just him, of course. In the program’s code there was a method that made it install almost instantly on any kind of computer.
Patrick double-clicked the program’s shortcut and a startup window came up that said “CHRONIVAC 4.0”. The startup window went away and the program opened. The only thing that was in the program window was a diagram of the webcam being plugged into the computer. Pat took the USB connector of the webcam and plugged it into a port on the side of the computer screen. Upon registering that the webcam was connected, the program put up another diagram that showed a person pushing the button on top of the webcam with the lens facing him. The description of the image read, “Point the emitter at what you desire to be transformed and press the button on the top.” Patrick pointed the emitter at himself and pushed the button. There was a small beep and instantly all of his information, which Pat saw was accurate down to the small birthmark shaped like texas on his right buttock, appeared on screen. Buttons now appeared on the left side of the window. Patrick saw that they said everything from “change body part” to “alter species” to “inanimate”. He even saw a section for mental changes.
Pat debated over what he wanted to change first and decided to start small. He clicked on the “change body part” button and a virtual version of him appeared on the screen. He selected the eyes option and a small list of categories came up. He liked his bright green eyes, but he wanted to see if this program worked the way it said it did. He selected the animal category and another list of categories appeared. He scrolled down the list, looking for one that would interest him. He finally settled on amphibian and yet another list of options came up. He chose the toad option and clicked ok. The program then brought up a dialogue box that had a list of options with radio buttons next to them. The college student looked the options over and he realized that these options would determine who would be aware of the change. The options were: subject only, no one, subject and select others, subject and user (which was greyed out as the user was the subject in this case), and everyone. Patrick thought about it and finally clicked the radio button next to the subject and select others option, typing the name of his best friend, Jackson Ryan Morris, Jr., into the text box. He clicked ok again and heard his computer make a small *ding* sound. The dialogue box now read, “processing”. Patrick then noticed his eyes were starting to itch like crazy. He shut them tight, hoping to tear up so that the itching would stop. As suddenly as it started, the itching stopped. He opened his eyes and saw that the text in the box now read, “transformation complete.” The window went away and Pat was looking at the virtual model of himself again.
Pat got up from his chair and ran over to his door and shut it, examining his reflection in the mirror hung on the back of it. His changed eyes stared back at him. “Holy shit, it works” he thought. “It actually fucking works.” He experimented with some facial expressions. No matter what he did with his mouth, though, his eyes stared blankly back at him. He blinked twice, his eyelids moving up from the bottom of his eyes instead of from the top. Pat thought that it was kind of creepy, but also cool at the same time. He turned away from the mirror and went back to his computer. He sat down in his chair and started experimenting some more. He started with changing the bones in his neck to allow his head to swivel a full 360 degrees (but only made himself aware of that so as to not freak people out), then moved on to giving himself a 3-foot-long prehensile black cat tail (this time he again made only himself and Jack aware of the change). After he had gotten used to all these changes, which only took about 5 minutes, he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and called the aforementioned Jack Morris. Jack picked up after two rings. When Patrick heard the call connect, he said, “Dude, get your ass over to my place right now. I’ve gotta show you something.”
“Alright, fine,” Jack had replied. He had then hung up the phone and walked down the street to his best friend’s house.
Pat waited in the small vestibule for his best friend. After about 10 minutes, he heard the doorbell ring. Pat moved to the door and opened it, waiting for his friend to notice. “Hey, Pat,” Jack had said. “What was it that you…” He trailed off as he looked into Patrick’s eyes. “Holy shit,” Jack said. “What the fuck is up with your eyes?” Pat smiled a smile that did not reach his now expressionless eyes. “Let me show you.” He beckoned for his friend to follow. Jack did so and shut the door behind him. He looked at his friend’s retreating form and asked, while following him, “You gonna tell me why you have a tail?” Patrick swiveled his head around to look at his friend. “Like I said, Jack,” said Pat, swishing his tail back and forth. “Let me show you.” Patrick returned his head to the right way around and the two of them walked up the stairs and into Pat’s room. Patrick walked over to his computer, sat down, and moved his chair to the right so that Jack could see it. The latter looked at the screen and saw the program. “What’s this?” he asked his changed friend. Pat smiled and replied, “This, Mr. Morris, would be the Chronivac 4.0, a program that lets the user alter anything and everything in the physical world and make it seem like it was always the case.” Jack thought that that was bullshit, but then remembered what his friend had looked like when he had answered the door. “Who else notices your eyes and tail besides me?” he asked. “No one,” Pat answered, pointing the emitter at Jack. “Hold still,” he said. He hit the button and Jack heard a small *beep* from his friend’s computer. A virtual model of Jack appeared on the screen. Jack saw Patrick click a few things and when the latter was done felt a splitting pain in his Jaw. He wasn’t sure what was going on. He would find out, though, that the pain was his entire mouth being restructured and altered into the snake’s mouth he was now examining in the mirror.
“Dude,” Jack said again, “what elsssse can thissss thing do?” Pat shrugged and said, “I think a better question would be ‘what CAN’T this thing do?’.” Jack made a show of thought before saying, “We have the world at our fingertipsss with thisss thing.” Pat nodded emphatically and said, “Yeah, we do. However, I think I wanna experiment on a more personal level for a little longer first.” Jack thought about that and said, “Alright then, what ssshould we do next?”