Racer, A Hamster's Tale

The First Two Chapters

Prologue
Once upon a time, in a green and beautiful land, there lived an evil scientist and he had a pet hamster. His name was Racer. The hamster, that is. Not that it’s important, just in case you wanted to know.


Chapter 1

Racer ran round and round, round and round, round and round, flying down the pathway to heaven. At least, that’s the way he saw it. To anyone else it looked like a hamster’s exercise wheel, but to Racer it was his outlet for stress. It’s not easy being the beloved pet of a mad scientist.
Lefter wandered into the room looking around for a clue as to why he was there. He was sure there was something he was supposed to be doing, but he couldn’t remember what. But memory lapse wasn’t what Lefter was known for. Lefter had a genetic quirk that urged him to turn to the left whenever he was going somewhere. Lefter wasn’t his real name, of course. No one could remember what his original name was. He was just Lefter. He spent a lot of his life going in circles.
Finally, Lefter’s eyes landed on the box of hamster food and he remembered, feed Racer! That’s what Dr. Cutter had told him to do. Dr. Cutter was Lefter’s uncle and had no patience for his nephew’s mistakes, or anyone else’s. Lefter filled Racer’s food dish, gave him fresh water and a piece of advice: ‘Take a break pal. You’re going to wear yourself out on that thing.’
Racer understood him, but he couldn’t stop. He had a genetic quirk too, and that was to run in circles for hours on end. He had what Dr. Cutter called ‘the round and round gene.’ When other hamsters would knock off for a nap and a smoke, Racer would keep on going. Among the other hamsters he was known as something of an oddball. Across the room, large golden eyes watched the cage on the counter. Squeaker Cat had long had plans to get her claws on that uppity good-for-nothing rodent. Sooner or later someone was going to make a mistake and leave that cage door open; she could wait. She settled herself down into her basket where she could keep an eye on the cage and purred quietly to herself.
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In another part of the building, Dr. Helga Lindstrom and Dr. Linda Lapp slumped their shoulders and stared at each other. Ever since their attempt to clone Alan Greenspan had failed, their stock had fallen in their boss’s eyes.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with those Greenspan cells, Helga” complained Dr. Linda. “Why can’t they multiply in a regular sequence like ordinary cells? Is that too much to ask? After all, all those other people we cloned turned out fine.”
“It’s not that they can’t multiply,” replied Dr. Helga. “They don’t want to; they’re using some obscure formula that no one else can understand, not surprising, considering the source. But what about us? If we get the axe, can we take some of this stuff with us? Anthrax, plague, Ricin; what do you think would look good on a resume?” They shuffled their lab notes and checked the wall clock for lunchtime.
“Come on, Linda, if we get sacked, we can at least do it on a full stomach. I hear that it’s chicken pot pie today.” Dr. Linda straightened up and smiled. Maybe there was hope after all.
~~~~~~~~~
Dr. Cutter, the head of Plastic Genetics Laboratory, had been scowling at them in the hallway lately and rumors of layoffs and budget cuts had been flying faster than you could blink. Racer Rumors they were called. Dr. Cutter would be seen petting and talking to his pet hamster and afterwards would be heard talking aloud to himself about “incompetent associates” and “things around here have to change”. No one was sure if the hamster was giving suggestions to his owner or not; however, no one held any grudges against Racer. He was a friendly, outgoing hamster and the lab staff liked him.
Located in the beautiful river hills of Lancaster County, the Plastic Genetics Laboratory-LLC- was cutting-edge medical technology. Dr. Cutter, despite his name, was not a surgeon. No! No cut-and-stitch monsters would be coming out of this laboratory; Dr. Cutter was a geneticist. The mixing and matching of DNA from far and wide was his magic wand, his alchemy. Okay, so the kudzu-piranha creature hadn’t worked out so well. After it had escaped from the lab and eaten a small child, there was no end of trouble hushing the incident up. But Dr. Cutter didn’t allow himself to be deterred by setbacks. There was always another day, always another pairing to try-especially when he had customers with deep pockets to fund his work. Governments too were a steady source of income. Foreign or domestic, Dr. Cutter didn’t care. His mission statement was: Ethics are for sissies!
Chapter 2

At the corner of Park Ave and East 41st St., Manhattan, in a stuffy, opulent study, business leaders were doing what business leaders do best: drinking, smoking and plotting how to transfer money from your pocket to theirs. The Tobacco Overlords, American Division, (T.O.A.D.) meeting had ended and joy had not been dispensed. No matter how you tried to explain it or disguise it, sales were down. Their archenemy, the American Lung Association, was having great success helping people quit smoking. Their latest announcement was a contest to create a vaccine against nicotine.
Burlington Chesterfield leaned back in his chair and eyed his companions with no enthusiasm. They were good enough for drinking and poker parties, but they had no vision, no creativity, he thought.
“It’s not like the old days, Barclay,” intoned Chesterfield. “We can’t go around putting our hands into people’s pockets and taking money blatantly like the IRS does. That would be sweet. What a set-up those guys have! We need something new, Barclay, something so subtle that people won’t even realize that they’re being robbed. No, we have to come up with a new angle.”
Barclay frowned with unaccustomed mental effort. “What about using the candy cigarettes idea, with some real cigarettes mixed in?” he asked. “We could give away free samples at kindergartens, day-care centers and playgrounds. It’s amazing how many parents don’t notice what their kids are doing.”
“We tried that five years ago and the ALA jumped all over us. We need to move into an area that they aren’t watching. I mean, people are going to die anyway, why shouldn’t they have a nice smoke while they’re doing it?” He drummed his fingers on the table and surveyed the blank I-don’t-have-any-ideas faces turned toward him. He sighed; it looked like he was going to have to think up of a new tacitc to pull the company out of its slump.
But he didn’t feel good, not at all. A dull pressure started forming around his heart, growing in intensity. He tried to push the tingling pain out of his mind. Suddenly he grasped his heart, lurching forward onto the long mahogany table with a loud, gasping groan.
“No! No! Not again,” he begged an unknown power. “Why? Why? We only want to make money, is that a crime?”
“Chesterfield, what’s wrong? Should I call an ambulance?” Barclay looked anxiously at his C.E.O. and froze in indecision. Should he reach for the phone or seize his chance and finish the old buzzard off? But Barclay hesitated a little too long and Burlington pulled himself back into his chair and forced his features into a mask of calm control.
“No, no, it’s not a heart attack, another person just quit smoking! It always gets to me like that. What are we going to do? If these damn health people convince the public that tobacco’s bad for them, we’re goners! Call the lawyers! Ever since we tried that marketing campaign aimed at kids, we need to be careful. Damn shame, too; that was going so well.”
~~~~~~~~~
It is at this point, if there are any tobacco lawyers reading this, that they should put down their swords and their cell phones and go back to doing whatever it is that tobacco lawyers do all day long. Possibly working to make the world a better place.