Professor Xerox was lazing around. It was a Sunday. He had stuffed himself with greasy stuffed parathas ,which his dutiful wife had prepared.

Professor would have given up the extreme-right suffix after his name (Some honorary degree) if he could replace the word ‘dutiful’ with ‘beautiful’ in the preceding
Sentence.

Nevertheless, beauty is only skin-deep, thought Xerox on this Sunday. Actually he rarely thought this way. But a load full of mashed potatoes, floating in high cholesterol, deep inside his stomach, always changed the way he thought.

Xerox was a professor of chemistry in a COLLAGE in DHILI University. He was one of those face-less characters in the university, who seem to have a very lose connection with ions and atoms. He hated teaching… but was on the verge of taking a quantum leap…rumours were doing the rounds of Dhili University that he would soon be promoted as a deputy Vice-Chancellor.

Dhili University had nothing to lose, everything to gain, by promoting Xerox . This University placed a premium on loose connections; also on professors who could double up as high-fidelity copiers !

While lazing around on this Sunday, to break the monotony, Xerox picked up the glossy section of the Sunday newspaper. Nothing caught his interest at first. Xerox was not only loosely connected with chemistry, he had no strong bonds with politics, cinema or archaeology either. The glossy was full of stories that had no relevance for Xerox. There was nothing that could help him in his talk-shows in the lecture halls of the collage. 

 And there was nothing worth cutting and slipping under the glass-top of his soon-to-be table in the office of the deputy Vice-Chancellor!

Then in an inconspicuous corner, he saw a single-columned piece on ‘virus’. Why this subject caught professor’s interest is not known. But Xerox read with undiluted interest. The subject did not fall into either of the two categories mentioned above; but Xerox suddenly was possessed with a strong urge to have the article photo-copied.

One particular line had probably made all the difference : “virus is a useful model for studying how molecules may have organised themselves into self-perpetuating units at the dawn of life” .

“Well, well! Let it be virus, if virus is what it takes, to teach us a thing or two, about survival !” thought Xerox.

While our revered professor was churning this new-found piece of genetic-chemistry in his brain, the residual mashed potatoes, still floating in high cholesterol, and not yet having entered the small intestine, turned turtle inside his stomach.

This tummy-chemistry sent a signal to our chemist’s spine-bottomed flask (his brain) –and he yawned.

Soon, Xerox was dozing away. Oblivious to the dutiful wife. Oblivious to the desire of changing ‘duty’ to ‘beauty’ in the preceding sentence. Oblivious to the mashed potatoes. Oblivious to the glossy section of the paper that now lay in a dismembered heap around his legs.

Professor Xerox then entered the world of dreams. He found himself at the very dawn of life. At first he did not recognise himself-even in his dream. But the GRAND CHEMISTRY is much different than what he taught in the Collages. It soon sent an intelligent impulse. Xerox immediately recognised himself as a young VIRUS at the very dawn of life.

Then suddenly, as it happens in dreams, someone whispered in his young ears : “ Your essence is self-preservation. Achieve it through reproduction, proliferation, adaptation and mutation !”

Xerox did not question this fact, even for a moment, how someone could whisper in the ears of a virus---or if viruses have ears in the first place ! But then one does not normally question things in one’s dreams.

“But how can I do this ? I am just a young and ignorant little virus ?” the virus-that-was-Xerox asked. And the whisperer replied : “ Do some espionage, you idiot !!”
“Oh !”

“Get into a host. Learn something about its internal cell chemistry. Grab what you can !” saying this, the whisperer, who was in any case invisible, disappeared.

Xerox was still merrily dreaming. But the dream sequence played a super-fast-forward. From the very dawn of life, the dream had now progressed to the time, that could well be called dusk. And the setting was somewhere in Dhili University.

Again, Xerox had difficulty at first to recognise himself, As now he had grown into a full-blooming virus; that had changed, thanks to mutagenesis. But this time he was no green-horn. He soon recognised himself occupying the Vice-Chancellor’s desk.

At this stage, the dutiful (not beautiful) wife of our dear old Xerox must have lost her patience. She shouted :” Get up you lazy dreamer ! Go fetch some vegetables ! What am I going to cook for dinner ?”

The dream sequence suddenly changed from dusk to twilight. Xerox was torn : between the desire to go on dreaming and the call of duty. Mashed potatoes won in the end. Xerox came back to this mundane world. He hurried to the wretched market but his  thoughts were still stuck at the VC’s desk !

Xerox could not sleep that night. He tossed and turned in his bed. How could he learn the lessons from dear old virus ! How could he learn the art of self-perpetuation ! How could he grow up! from being a young green-horn into a fully-blown virus and become the Vice-Chancellor !

By the next morning, his  entire body was aching . He was running high fever.

And can you guess what was the  doctor’s diagnosis ?

“VIRAL FEVER”