The cruise

The man walked down the corridor, walking by several of his colleagues who hard at work preparing for phase II of the operation. Stepping into the elevator, he pressed a button labeled “b27” indicating the lowest floor in the complex, the 27’Th basement level where his boss had summoned him. The trip took about 2 minutes. Arriving at the basement, he stepped out the elevator, walking down a long corridor the finally arrived at a large door, pressing a button beside it.

“Come in, Jack”, a disembodied voice said. The large doors opened and Jack walked in. The room was large and spherical, each of the walls had rows of seats, and several high-ranking members (as Jack was) were seated. The center of the room had a holographic display of the North Eastern United States and Canada. Seated in a raised chair surrounded by several computer consoles, was Jacks Boss, the leader of the organization. Several armed heavily armed and armored guards flanked him.

As instructed, Jack sat down in one of the surrounding chairs. Pressing a few buttons to activate the speaker system, the man in the center of the room began to speak.

“Today is a significant day for us all. Phase 2 has begun. Phase one went flawlessly. 200 confirmed replacements. All of our operatives have provided us with excellent information. But it’s time to move beyond replacing civilians and to move up to the next level.” Pressing several buttons, he changed the holographic display into one that showed the faces of several dozen people. He continued;

“2 weeks ago, every person on this list was sent an invitation for a cruise. The cruise will take them to an island 200 kilometers of the east coat, is it there that we will make our move.” Again pressing several buttons, he changed the display to a cruise ship, the crowd reacting with surprise.

“I’m sure you all familiar with our liner, the lanigera. Your jobs are to pose as the crew. You will be provided with the exact details of what are to do. Each of the people we will be replacing is an executive at a company in the target area, we will be replacing them all”

***

Gilbert Simons had recently been promoted to Senior Executive at Kretek Software. When he received an invitation for a cruise that would include a stop off at an island for a Barbecue, he was quick to accept. He had never been on a cruise before and this seemed to be the perfect opportunity. Boarding the luxury liner lanigera he saw several other people he knew. Some he knew as friends, other as corporate rivals. Shaking hands they all greeted, this was an occasion to relax and mingle, not to worry about corporate rivalry.

The last of the guests boarded and the ship headed off towards in destination.

Gilbert spent most of the trip talking to the others guests. Not only was the trip an opportunity to meet executives from other companies, but it was also a good chance for them to get to know him, and to get on their good side.

About an hour into the trip he met up with the CEO of a company close to his, David Proohy of Kremin industries. They were not in competition and had met a few times and gotten along pretty good. Seeing him, David walked up to him and they started to talk while walking around the ship.

Margaret May, a manager at a software company enjoyed the buffet, making sure not too eat too much so she’d have room for the BBQ supper that they’d he having soon. Walking below decks, she found the ships art gallery and decide to look at some of the pictures. Finding another passenger also viewing the pictures, together they commented on several of them.

Finally the ship arrived at the island, stopping at the dock on the East Side of it. The captain announced over the loud speaker that the ship had arrived and everyone disembarked. On the island there were several guides who escorted everyone to the center of the island where everything had been prepared. There was a huge buffet, with every salad imaginable, all sorts of different kinds of drinks and dozens of different kinds of meats.

***

“Excellent work Jack, it should begin within a few minutes. Our transports are ready at the other side of the island. Once all the guests are ‘done’ contact the transports and we will begin the extraction.”

“Yes sir” Jacks voice (on the communications device) said.

“Doctor, The stage is set. Prepare rooms 200-400, and neural devices 1-200. We are about to have 200 incoming guests. See that their stay is short”

“Ill see to it sir” the doctors voice said.

Turning around in his chair, and looking at his view of the island a smile formed on the leader face.

“The game is afoot”

***

Sitting on the beech on beech chairs, Gilbert and David enjoyed the feast. Gilbert was finishing off a streak, potato salad and coleslaw, and David was finishing off ribs with Caesar salad. Both of them had a beer.

“This is some of the most incredible food I’ve ever tasted in my life, I’ll have to remember to compliment the chef” David said she sipped his beer.

“You got that straight, maybe we can convince them to give us the recipe”, Gilbert replied. Watching two of the younger female executives, who were running on the beech and had since put on bikini’s a smile, crossed their faces.

“I hear the water is here is quite warm, and I forgot my bathing suit, think they’d be willing to forget theirs to go for a swim,” Gilbert playfully said.

“Remember they say you shouldn’t go swimming for at least an hour after swimming” David responded.

“Bah, spoilsport” Gilbert responded with.

As he finished his last word, they heard one of the women scream, no one was around so they ran towards them to see what was wrong. They caught up to them to see the first one staring at the second one is shock, looking at her they saw what was wrong. Lying on her stomach on the beech, the entire bottom half of her body looked like a sea lions. Her legs had merged, and skin and muscle had grown in so it looked natural, her feet had become flippers and had spread out. Looking at her face, she has whiskers growing out of her nose, and her hands were turning into flippers.

“What the hell?” Said David and Gilbert terrified by what they saw. Before their eyes the and young and beautiful woman was quickly becoming an animal. Her arms continued to get shorter and her hands longer, now changing into a shape very much like a sea lion’s flippers. Her hair had all fallen off and her face was stretching out into a muzzle. Her torso quickly became much more rounded, and what was left of bikini ripped apart. Desperate she said

“No! This is impossible, this is ugh ark! Ark! Ark! Ark” all three stood back, staring at the barking sea lion that mere minutes ago was a human.

“This is crazy, it’s impossible, it must be a trick or something…” David was cut off by Gilbert who raising his arm into the air, showed them his right hand, the fingers had become webbed! He could feel his legs trying to grow together, and soon lost balance. His pants ripped open violently, skin had grown between his legs and it his face was pulling out into a muzzle. Watching Gilbert and the women, he saw that they were not far behind. His arms continued to shrink, eventually shrinking into his body, while his hands grew longer and became flippers. His feet quickly changed shape and became flippers, the skin between his legs now quickly growing. Feeling his humanity and his future quickly slipping away, he spoke.

“It was a trap. But why do this to us, why turn us in…. in … ark ark ark ark ark”.

Throughout the island, the other guests were quickly experiencing the same fate. Within an hour all of them had been fully transformed into sea lions.

Landing on the island in his helicopter, Jack surveyed the scene. Everywhere he looked were sea lions, most of them still had bits to torn clothing on top of or under them, the only sign that any of them had been human less then an hour before. Reaching into his pocket he lifted out a communications device, telling the transportation vehicles to prepare. Confirming that all of the guest had been transformed, he placed a gas mask and protective clothing on, instructing the other members of the organization still on the island to do the same.

A minute later several helicopters flew over, spraying the entire island with a mist that knocked out all of the sea lions. Confirming this, jack gave the single command of

“lets do it”.

***

Gilbert began to regain consciousness; everything came back into focus. The last thing he remember was being turned into a sea lion and suddenly feeling dizzy and passing out. Looking around he saw that he was in a room, a room with white walls and no furnishings at all, and he was lying on his stomach on a bed. Looking in front of him, he saw a mirror, the reflection was that of a sea lion lying on a bed. It hadn’t of been a dream, he really had been transformed into a sea lion. Not knowing where he was, he tried to call to see if anyone was there. But when he tried to speak, the only sounds he made was

“ark ark ark ark ark!”, the barking of a sea lion.

“It’s pointless to try to speak Gilbert”,

“but perhaps if you clap your flippers together and bark some more, maybe you’ll get a fish”. That comment annoyed him, what had been done to him was bad enough, but being mocked was too much. Suddenly the mirror in front of him vanished, and 3 people could be seen standing in a small room, one of them walked forward and spoke.

“You’re probably wondering where you are and why this has been done to you. You are a small part of a much larger plan.” Motioned to his left he summoned someone to walk into view. Gilbert was stunned to see what appeared to be himself, that is his human self-standing in the room.

“No my pinniped friend, your not seeing things. Our friend here is a clone of you; he was been given all of your memories. Shortly he, along with the clones of all the people on the cruise will be returning. No one will ever know they aren’t really who they say they are.”. The gravity of his situation hitting him, Gilbert felt frightened, and tried to ask why they were doing this, but all that came out were barks. The man continued.

“Don’t despair, he will not harm anyone you know, he will be taking your place. You will not be harmed either. You will, along with all of your friends on the cruise be taken to a natural habitat where you will live out the rest of your lives as animals. While that may seem cruel, consider this; we could just have easily have killed you all, or turned you into minnows and fed you to a piranha. I suggest you accept your fate and try to enjoy it, that body could be a lot of fun if you accept It.”. With that the room began to fill with gas, everything went fuzzy and Gilbert passed out.

He awoke on a beech; he had no idea where he was or how long he had been unconscious. There were other sea lions there with him. He couldn’t tell how many, but all of the people on the cruise seemed to be there. Breathing in his he realized his sense of smell was significantly better then as a human, he could discern the scents of each other sea lion there, and the smells from the ocean were alluring. He could smell food and found himself getting hungry. Making his way to the ocean, he jumped in, supper was waiting.