Timothy Barker was a college student on Solana. He had a girlfriend named Patty and friends named Tony Miller and Teddy Baker. One day while sipping coffee at a cafe, Patty told them about a university experiment. It was said to make a person smarter and their action time improved. ” That looks like something we could use,” said Patty. “Dr Reynolds is overseeing the whole thing. We like him, don’t we? It should be safe.”
“They are giving out six credits and it should only take six weeks,” said Teddy.
“Sounds too good to pass up,” said Tony.
The next morning, they went to see Dr Reynolds. He gave each of them paperwork to fill out. He explained that they might experience some untoward effect. Maybe they would be taller. Maybe their hair might be longer. Unfortunately, Dr Reynolds was having trouble getting his minimum of one hundred subjects. He skimmed over the paperwork. Really just pointing out where they were to sign the releases. They all signed every single one. They sealed their fates.
They each had a thorough physical. Blood was taken. Then more blood and then more tests. In between all this, they were, without fanfare, injected with a substance that would change their lives forever. They bunked in rooms of ten. Patty went with the girls. Timothy did not like to see her go. It was the last time he remembered seeing her in her cute, yellow dress with little flowers.
The routine was the same. More labs. But now they had physicals every time they saw the doctor. They were given scrubs to wear each day. More injections.
It was Teddy who first noticed. His arms were getting more hair. It was longer than normal. The next day he noticed it on his legs. Timothy noticed the hair all over his body increasing. His nails were getting longer too. He was starting to feel uncomfortable about this experiment. When he saw Tony and Teddy he noticed they were starting to change a lot. He started to panic. He talked to his friends. They were starting to get anxious. They went to Dr Reynolds. They told him that they didn’t like the changes that were happening to them. They wanted to be released from the program. He said they would be fine. They could not leave at this time. It wouldn’t be safe for them. Their anxiety level increased. They decided to find Patty and leave.
The Doctor said, “ just a minute” and he left closing the door behind him. They heard the click of the lock. They shook the door. It would not open. They were frightened. They started to notice a chemical smell. That was the last that they remembered.
When he woke, Timothy found himself in a cell. He looked down and saw his body covered in hair. Like a dog. No clothes. What has happened to me, he thought. He banged on the door to be released. A few minutes later two men arrived and opened the door. They warned him that if he resisted they would just gas him again. They walked him down a long hall to a room where there were others like him. They were being pushed through a portal.
“Where are we going?” he said.
“Agra,” a voice said as he was pushed through. So began Timothy’s life of living in the wilderness. A college student caught up in a failed science experiment learned to forage for food in the wild. It wasn’t really wild. It was farmland. The farmers saw the furry college students as vermin to be shot or trapped. The ones who survived had learned to dodge the bullets and the traps.
Timothy was finally caught in a trap and sent to a cell in the meat packing plant on Granville. He was rescued by Matilda and Jack in one of their incursions to find mutant BlueStone prisoners. Timothy’s story begins here in the novel, Matilda and her Alien. as he finds friends and settles into life in the colony.
Timothy
