Chimeras 05
Page 1
Chimeras 05
Brae and Blaxy sat in their matching healer pods. They were both only had a few minutes to go. Brae’s fur was shorter on 1 side from where part had been singed off. His light skin was visible in some patches. But he was fine knowing he was being healed and everyone survived. He looked over at Asta like she was a heavenly being on a pedestal. He tried keeping up the chatter with Blaxy to distract himself.
Blaxy by now was feeling so energised that he was spinning around in circles and squishing the gel between his fingers to keep himself amused. Gabby pulled a chair up beside them and watched the conversation happening on the big screen.
Brae called Melinda over. “ Mel.” She was standing at Kayden’s shoulder watching the huge screen as Kayden spoke to Adri Freyr. She’d been watching Freyr’s 2 assistants with a look of horror on her face. The thin twins that concentrated on typing so fast into keyboards they almost forgot to breathe. Their finger taps were hail on a tin roof. Melinda was shocked out of her stare by Brae’s voice.
“Melinda, that quad rotor was named The Badger.” Brae stated calmly. “Know anything about it?”
Gabby looked up. “I do.”
Melinda walked over and looked to Gabby. Brae and Blaxy directed their attention towards Gabby who seemed less and less shy by the minute. “Priscilla Best, the girl that threatened you in cooking class; her dad is one of the leaders of the Shootman’s society. They did an interview with him for TV a few months ago. The Badger is one of his prized killing machines.”
Melinda’s face paled. She wasn’t trained as a body guard. She shouldn’t have to scope out a whole school’s family background before sending someone she was responsible for into it. But it looked like that was the path that they’d landed themselves on. ‘This is all getting so much!’ She looked down.
Kayden sat in front of his large screen that Adri Freyr stared out of.
Freyr was still talking while the twins tapped keyboards behind him. Asta stood beside Kayden, in human form with a sly grin on her face.
Freyr continued his statement about how Brae and the younger cheps should make their way immediately to Iceland to study with him. Iceland had a much better tolerance for hybrids, Freyr claimed.
‘What an odd thing to say.’ Kayden thought.
Freyr had given the back story of how he came to be where he was as an expert in his field. The deCODE genetics company had been collecting the DNA of Iceland’s population since 1996. The idea was to find genetically transmitted diseases in the DNA sequencing and alter them so that through generations the diseases would never show up again. This struck international criticism in 2003 about people’s privacy and the idea was cancelled. The company declared bankruptcy shortly after.
Freyr was an 18 year old intern in the company at the time. He’d already achieved a master’s degree in microbiology specialising in human disease but he was most interested in nano-engineering and advancement of human technology. He studied this on his own rather than sleeping. He was a young inventor devoted to human life surviving the next few decades without wiping themselves out. This was what occupied his mind most of the time. It resulted in people viewing him as cynical; which was a just first observation. But on the other hand he was one of the wisest and most hopeful people on the planet.
He’d started his own company funded by his family that centred on disease. It hit big with the diagnosis scanners that scanned the cells of your skin, the blood vessels in your eyes and the blood if any was visible. Epicurus had expanded on the scanners by turning them into small portable wands.
Epicurus also used Freyr nanotech for the healing pods. It was quite common for the nano-bots to find other issues with the body and report back to the pod computer that the issue was fixed. It was Epicurus’ company that made the gel and gel pods that keep the bots dormant and then electrically boot them when they were needed. Freyr knew very well of Epicurus’ renewable and conservationist views and that’s why he used his products even though they had to be shipped from half a world away.
The 2 looked at each other with mutual appreciation of the others work. Kayden looked down. He’d let down his family by letting the attackers get so close to the building. If it hadn’t been for Asta watching out for them then they would extremely likely all be dead right now. But Kayden felt a flash of anger wash over him
‘I’m a peaceful man that helps the world. I don’t destroy it! I shouldn’t have to arm my buildings! I cannot stand explosives!’
“Kayden.” Freyr continued. His Icelandic accent sounded partly Victorian and proper like a well-spoken gentleman. It snapped Kayen Epicurus from his mood swing. “You know it’s the smart choice. Your whole family can be put up over here by me. It’s safest if you all leave immediately. I have friends in Singapore that will refuel your jets.”
“My jets have all been taken away. There’s no way we can get on a public passenger plane. I’m old friends with the prime minister but I don’t know if even he could swing something my way.”
Melinda piped up. “Speak to Borsak anyway! He might be able to sort us out.”
Gabby squeaked from across the room; yet again figuring out a problem for them. “I can take you. My family has lots of planes. It won’t bother my father at all. She kept to herself that she probably wouldn’t even tell him she’s taking one.
‘I’ll be back in a few days. He probably won’t even notice I left.’ She thought.
It was Asta that replied to her first. “Can you pilot? Is the plane big enough to make it from Singapore to Reykjavik? It’s normally an 8 and a half hour flight from Sydney to Singapore, then a further 15 hours to Reykjavik.”
Gabby smiled. “That’s how long the flight was before mini-thorium nuclear reactors were put into aircraft. We’ll be doing it in one flight and it’ll take about 12 hours. I’ll be flying over Europe though. I can’t stand flying too close to America if I can avoid it. It’s getting worse there every year.”
They nodded in agreement.
Gabby didn’t realise how confident she was being but she suddenly held the attention of the whole room. She somehow had agreed to be their pilot and listed experience that the group had not realised she’d had until now.
The group stared at her. Melinda walked to her and hugged her. “I knew there was a reason I liked you.”
Gabby blushed. It’d been years since she’d had a decent female role model and Melinda didn’t realise how much good she was doing for Gabby’s frame of mind.
Asta sat down in a swivel chair. “I never expected someone I met on the first day at an Australian school to have thorium powered planes.” She seemed excited and she smiled at Gabby. “I can’t wait for you to all to see Iceland!”