Krishna kumar Mani - SFS2 - Science Fiction Short Stories

“The medicine you have taken kills you within twenty-four hours if you tell a lie. Be careful what you say if you want to live.”

The people from the village for scared. For days they didn’t even talk to one another because they were afraid they might lie by accident and then die.

After a week no one had died since no one had even spoken since they had been told what the medicine did.

“I have no idea if the medicine actually works. People are too afraid to talk,” said the king to the master of medicine.

In response, the master assembled the people from the village and spoke to them.

“Dear people of the village. You should not be afraid to talk for the truth is simple. If you tell the truth, you don’t need to remember anything. When you lie you have to think more and have to remember what you said. Just simply don’t tell lies when you speak to one another and you’ll be fine.”

He paused for a moment before continuing. “When you speak the truth to others, you may face problems. But you should take pride since honesty is a virtue of a good person. And any problems you will have will come from being a good person.”

A few weeks later, people became less scared and went back to their usual life. The king was surprised and implemented the medicine in the whole country. There were a few deaths, but the king was happy.

Fifty years passed. Then the king’s son became the ruler of the kingdom.

People had forgotten the meaning of the word lie. And the master of medicine himself was dying. He requested the king to meet him before he died.

“Master, why do you reject all forms of medicine?” asked the young king.

“I don’t require medicine any more. My life will end. I am at peace with that,” replied the master.

“You are a legend and a great boon to this kingdom. I will grant you any wish that you desire.”

“You don’t need to do anything. I know that you’ve started to build a temple for me. But please stop construction. People should not even know the word ‘lie’ or its meaning.”

“Construction on the temple will be stopped as you have asked. But we need your assistance, master. I need the formula for the medicine that kills people if they tell lies. It isn’t required for our country, but if we capture another country in the future it will be needed.”

“I will tell you about the formula. There is no formula. Nothing can stop someone from telling a lie, only their attitudes can do that.”

“What do you mean?” asked the young king.

“Yes, I told a lie. That lie was ‘if you tell a lie, you will perish within twenty-four hours.’ That’s all the people needed to change their attitudes. People were afraid to die so they told the truth to stay alive. They merely considered normal deaths to be due to lying and that kept them afraid.”

The master closed his eyes. The last words of his life came out of his mouth slowly. “That is the only lie I ever told in my life.” And with that, he died.

The young king was now confused as to what the truth was.

The first option was that what the master had said was true and that there had never been any medicine that killed people when they lied. Or that the master had told a lie and the medicine had taken effect on him and killed him.

Either way, the king was not ready to speak a lie or tell anyone about what the master of medicine had said.

Recently my company fired me for a mistake in the lab. I wasn’t actually the reason for the mistake, but they didn’t believe me. I doubt you’ll believe me either. Everyone thinks it’s my fault. But I can assure you, it was far from my fault.

Now I’m without a job. And what’s worse, I can’t continue my secret personal research. No one wants to hire me because I was caught using the company’s lab equipment for my own research. But I can’t help it. My mind is always going, always evaluating new problems and trying to find solutions. My stomach needs food just like my mind needs my research. And that research needs a lab. So I used what was available to me.

I can go without food for several days, but going without research is a problem. Since I’ve lost my job I’ve been struggling to find either food or research. I decided to post my research on a crowd-funding website, but only in vague terms as my exact research has been banned by the government. What that is, I dare not say yet. Listen to my story a little further.

The website is now my only hope. I wait and wait for someone to contact me and I check my inbox frequently. I need the most advanced equipment out there. PCR machines, electron microscopes, and that’s just the start. I can’t buy a fully equipped genetics lab, especially without a job. If God came and asked me what I wished for, I wouldn’t wish for sleep or for to be able to eat, only a fully equipped lab.

As I sat in my apartment, the doorbell rang.

“Mail’s here!”

I signed for the mail and noticed a large manila envelope. “Oh my God, this is a legal notice from my old company.”

The company was run by stupid guys. They had a world class environment for my genetic research, but what they employed me for was beyond boring. During my free time I used the equipment and started my research. I was able to clone any animal from only a strand of their hair. Mind you, it has to have the entire follicle intact so it can’t be hair from the barber’s that’s been cut. And the age of the individual matters. If I have hair from a twenty year old, the clone will come out to be twenty years old. If the hair is from a forty year old, the clone will be forty years old.

At first, my research began on a rat. And then I moved to a rabbit. After many initial successes, I decided that it was ready for human trial and set about to make a clone of myself. Of course all of this was done in secret in my lab office. No one in the company knew anything about it. And I have no idea why they invested so much money into the laboratory because there were machines they would never use. It was probably for dodging income tax, but I don’t know for sure. They gave me a lab and a salary, so what did I care?

Everything was going great until one day I damaged an expensive machine. The cost of the machine was… well, I don’t want to say what the cost of the machine was. This is the reason they sent me the legal notice. They are asking for a million dollars in reparations. But what’s a million dollars to a guy who has less than a hundred? It might have well had been a trillion.

I went back to surfing the internet while waiting for someone, anyone, to email me about my research. In the meantime, I planned to sell off some of my fitness equipment on eBay so that I could buy groceries.

Next day

Wow. Some idiot actually responded. I mean, some gentleman . He’s ready to provide a lab for my research. I can’t believe it. We spoke at length in a conference call. That meeting went well.

After that and a few more phone calls, I met with his authorized representative who said they were ready to provide whatever I needed. The lab was 250 miles away and was set up so that I could spend nights in the office. I packed my things. I wished I had my laptop from the old company, but at least it’s configured to overwrite the hard drive if too many incorrect log-in credentials are tried.

The next day, two guys came to my home and got me. One asked me to sit in the back of the Lincoln and they’d drive me to the lab. They handed me a mobile phone to talk with the boss.

“Welcome. My manager has told me much about your research. I’m happy to fund this project. I think it can be mutually beneficially. Is there anything you need?”

“We spoke about the lab equipment I had at my old company. That set up is what I need.”