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eBook Category: Science Fiction/Horror
eBook Description: Nathan McKee, a Tenderloin stumblebum, recovers from a severe beating and seizure, only to find that he can now trigger another kind of seizure, which leads to a bizarre skin alteration and transformation. The scary transformation offers him a chance to transform his life. He takes advantage of the opportunity in a surprising way.

eBook Publisher: Fictionwise.com, Published: Unnatural Selection: A Collection of Darwinian Nightmares, ed. Gord Rollo, 2002
Fictionwise Release Date: October 2002

36 Reader Ratings: Great Good OK Poor

Available eBook Formats [MultiFormat - What's this?]: Adobe Acrobat (PDF) [94 KB], eReader (PDB) [37 KB], Palm Doc (PDB) [24 KB], Rocket/REB1100 (RB) [22 KB], Microsoft Reader (LIT) [73 KB] - PocketPC 1.0+ Compatible, Franklin eBookMan (FUB) [96 KB], hiebook (KML) [83 KB], Sony Reader (LRF) [55 KB], iSilo (PDB) [20 KB], Mobipocket (PRC) [25 KB], Kindle Compatible (MOBI) [53 KB], OEBFF Format (IMP) [37 KB]
Words: 6787
Reading time: 19-27 min.
Microsoft Reader (LIT) Format: Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud ENABLED
Adobe Acrobat (PDF) Format:  Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud DISABLED
All Other formats: Printing DISABLED, Read-aloud DISABLED

Nathan McKee sat completely naked, except for his taped ribs, on the foot of his bed in his drab room in the Hotel Reo. Tiny beads of sweat popped out on his pale body, forehead, and upper lip, as he waited with a rising sense of nervous anticipation, wondering if the altered state would hit him again this evening--a rare emotional and infrequent speculative state of mind.

In fact, Nathan hadn't felt or thought much of anything since his wife, Geri, and their son, Davy, had died in an automobile accident near Kezar Stadium ten years ago. For most of the last decade he'd aimlessly wandered the Tenderloin of San Francisco in a numbed daze, his sensibilities usually anesthetized by liberal dozes of Old English, Gallo Tokay, and Wild Irish Rose. Once a hard-charging, tailored-suit on Montgomery Street in the financial district, he'd squandered everything since the accident, lucky now to even own a thread-bare, greasy, Navy-blue topcoat; and if it weren't for the monthly SSI checks, he would be sleeping in a cardboard tent in an alley. As it was Nathan always found himself panhandling at the end of each month just to make ends meet--a fifty-year-old drunken bum.

But he'd been booze-free for an entire week, since he'd been badly beaten and experienced a gran mal seizure over on O'Farrell Street near Homeboy's last Friday, the ass-kicking resulting in a heavy-medicated, four-day stay in San Francisco General. Yes, indeed, still clean and sober after being back on the street unsupervised for the last three days--infuckingcredible.

Nathan waited, relishing his accelerated pulse rate, the slight adrenaline rush, and his heightened sensibility, gazing with interest out his sixth-story, dirty window that faced westerly over Jones Street, watching the sun begin to drop out of sight behind the buildings along Van Ness hill, streaking the clouded sky with neon-oranges and -violets.

He knew he didn't have long to wait.

As dusk settled over the 'loin, Nathan again experienced the now familiar onset of the anticipated seizure, exactly like the last two nights since being released from SF Gen: A sudden painful tightening of the muscles in the pit of his stomach that doubled him over, followed immediately by a rapid increase in his heart rate; and, a moment later, an apparent forty-degree drop in the room temperature that chilled his sweaty body, making him clench his teeth. He groaned, upright but partially paralyzed now, his breathing labored. Suddenly, his vision tunnelled, and Nathan slipped into that other place...

Disoriented, dizzy, nauseous ... surroundings surreal, deep in a cold, dark cavern drawn toward blinding lights, stopping suddenly ... more like standing in the dark of an empty backstage and peering into glaring floodlights, frozen like a deer caught in the headlights of an onrushing car--

Abruptly, the stage curtain began to silently unfurl, dropping ever so slowly, gradually blocking out even the tiniest glimmer of light. Total blackness, like a starless night fallen in on itself. Alone in the dark. After a few moments he felt the sensation of sinking, as if he were being sucked down a black drain.

He lost consciousness...

Nathan awoke, still sitting completely nude on the foot of his bed. In the fifteen or so minutes he'd been unconscious, night had begun to settle heavily over the City, his room cloaked in darkness.

Taking quick personal inventory, he felt pretty good--his breathing, vision, pulse rate all back to normal, and his skin temperature had warmed up considerably. But, like the last two nights, his deathly-pale body and limbs had been altered during the seizure, taking on an inky mottling with a peculiar 3-D blurring effect. Staring into the palm of his hand was like looking into a deep, black pool of water that absorbed all light, reflecting nothing back, his hand and fingers made indistinct by the odd effect on light. Even close up, only a foot or so from his face, his hand looked blurry; and after stretching his arm out, the hand and wrist disappeared completely, blending in perfectly with the room's increasing darkness. Nervously, Nathan flexed his lower legs and toes and fingered the clear tape just under his right armpit--still tightly binding the two cracked ribs. With a dry chuckle he concluded: "Guess I'm still in one piece." It never occurred to him to call the doctors at SF Gen about his nightly skin alteration. Over the years he'd learned to accept whatever the Tenderloin dealt him with fatalistic resignation.

Nathan stood up, but stumbled and had to reach out, steady himself for a few seconds against the wall, his legs drained of energy, unsteady. He took a deep breath, then stepped cautiously across the small room, pausing for a second and glancing with boyish glee into the cracked dresser mirror a yard or two away. He saw an empty, unlit room, only a slight distortion of the dark atmosphere where he stood, as if a slight breeze had disturbed a wave of heat rising from a floor vent.

Dismissing explanations of the remarkable transformation, Nathan chuckled loudly, as he left the room, still unclothed.