Mutation by Robin Cook

"Maybe it will be more effective if you give him the message. Tell your father that life will be getting progressively unpleasant unless he reconsiders and is reasonable. You got that?"
         "Who is this?" VJ demanded.
         "Just give your father the message. He'll know."
         "Who is this?" VJ repeated, feeling the initial stirrings of fear. But the caller had hung up.
         VJ slowly replaced the receiver. All at once he was acutely aware that he was all alone in the house. He stood for a moment listening. He'd never realized all the creaking sounds of an empty house. The radiator in the corner quietly hissed. From somewhere else a dull clunking sounded, probably a heating pipe. Outside the wind blew snow against the window.
         Picking up the phone again, VJ made a call of his own. When a man answered he told the person that he was scared. After being reassured that everything would be taken care of, VJ put down the phone. He felt better, but to be on the safe side, he hurried downstairs and methodically checked every window and every door to make sure they were all securely locked. He didn't go down into the basement but bolted the door instead.
         Back in his room he turned on the computer. He wished the cat would stay in his room, but he knew better than to bother looking for her. Kissa was afraid of him, though he tried to keep his mother from realizing the fact. There were so many things he had to keep his mother from noticing. It was a strain. But then he hadn't chosen to be what he was, either.
         Booting up the computer, VJ loaded Pac-Man and tried to concentrate.
        
         The fluorescent lights blinked, then filled the room with their rude light. Victor stepped aside and let Marsha precede him into the lab. She'd been there on a few occasions, but it had always been during the day. She was surprised how sinister the place looked at night with no people to relieve its sterile appearance. The room was about fifty feet by thirty with lab benches and hoods along each wall. In the center was a large island comprised of scientific equipment, each instrument more exotic than the next. There was a profusion of dials, cathode ray tubes, computers, glass tubing, and mazes of electronic connectors.
         A number of doors led from the main room. Victor led Marsha through one to an L-shaped area filled with dissecting tables. Marsha glanced at the scalpels and other horrid instruments and shuddered. Beyond that room and through a glass door with embedded wire was the animal room, and from where Marsha was standing she could see dogs and apes pacing behind the bars of their cages. She looked away. That was a part of research that she preferred not to think about.
         "This way," Victor said, guiding her to the very back of the L, where the wall was clear glass.
         Flipping a switch, Victor turned on the light behind the glass. Marsha was surprised to see a series of large aquariums, each containing dozens of strange-looking sea creatures. They resembled snails but without their shells.
         Victor pulled over a stepladder. After searching through a number of the tanks, he took a dissecting pan from one of the tables and climbed the ladder. With a net, he caught two creatures from separate tanks.
         "Is this necessary?" asked Marsha, wondering what these hideous creatures had to do with Victor's concern about VJ's health.
         Victor didn't answer. He came down the stepladder, balancing the tray. Marsha took a long look at the creatures. They were about ten inches long, brownish in color, with a slimy, gelatinous skin. She choked down a wave of nausea. She hated this sort of thing. It was one of the reasons she'd gone into psychiatry: therapy was clean, neat, and very human.
         "Victor!" Marsha said as she watched him impale the creatures into the wax-bottomed dissecting pan, spreading out their fins, or whatever they were. "Why can't you