2156

by C M Dancha

  She knew that Mr. Sun had purposely made the caustic remark about her and Ekstrom. He probably thought he was being funny or witty. But if he knew the unspeakable things Klaus demanded of her sexually, he might not be so flippant with the smart-ass comments.

  Rollie's lovemaking was gentle and caring, giving more than he expected to receive. Klaus was demeaning, physical and lewd. Each time she saw Klaus he demanded a new perverted sex act of her. Their sex was full-blown sadism now with Sophia being more damaged with each rendezvous. It now took her several days to physically recover from an evening with Klaus.

  If Rollie had not cut her off from ReLife updates, she would have done everything possible to avoid Klaus. But he was her only reliable source of information now. She would have to go along with his sadism for a while longer until the CR47 was operational and the Black Cross could use the incubator. After that, she made herself a promise to exterminate the two men who abused her; Klaus and Mr. Sun. She would leave Rollie alone even though he was making her life difficult. At least his actions were not designed to hurt her.

  As Sophia daydreamed about how she intended to torture Klaus and Sun to death, both men were daydreaming about her. Klaus was cherishing his last meeting with her and thinking of the next perversion to put her through. And Mr. Sun, also known as Krieger of the Black Cross Tiger cell, was imagining how she would explode with anger after he cheated her out of the world credit bonus for using the CR47.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Problem Isolated, Now Prove It

  Six days after Slice's visit, Rollie and Claude were convinced the CR47 problems were due to only one malfunctioning AAC gauge. They ran hundreds of electronic, mechanical and electrical tests on the incubator. Everything pointed back to the faulty gauge. Because the AAC was a universal gauge, Rollie had Helmer Stanke bastardize another piece of equipment for a functioning gauge and installed it into the CR47. With the good and bad gauges hooked up in parallel, Rollie and his crew watched the different readings between the two gauges as conditions changed within the room and the incubator. There was no question that the AAC gauge which arrived with the CR47 from the manufacturer was defective.

  Rollie was surprised that Klaus added Helmer Stanke to the ReLife project for a couple of weeks. Besides Helmer being a talented engineer, he was also a key executive in the company and led several important departments. The financial success of Phoenvartis was tied into each of Helmer's pet projects. For Klaus to reassign him to Rollie's team spoke volumes about the importance of the ReLife project. Or maybe it spoke more to Klaus's fear of losing his job.

  Claude and Helmer weren't the best of friends, but they learned to tolerate each other for the success of the project. Helmer loved to pull pranks on Claude and joked non-stop with the young, nerdy German. Claude tried his best to trade humiliating, sarcastic quips with the senior vice president but his attempts were empty and often embarrassing. On several occasions, Rollie and Helmer couldn't stop themselves from laughing at Claude's lame put-downs. They were so pathetic compared to Helmer's cutting wit. As the days went by, Helmer cut back on his sarcastic remarks because Claude was such an easy mark.

  "Guys, it seems to me that the only problem with the CR47 is the AAC gauge. When the defective gauge was in the unit and we tried cloning, about two-thirds of the animals turned out as monstrosities. The faulty gauge forced the CR47 to pressurize its cabin incorrectly. When this happened, the chromosomes of the host mutated enough so the resulting clone was an abomination. Do you two agree with this hypothesis?"

  Helmer and Claude nodded in agreement. As an afterthought Helmer needed to ask, "Rollie, why did a few of the clones turn out okay if the AAC was malfunctioning?"

  "Good question, Helmer. I've been thinking about this and I think the answer is simple. Some of the clones turned out okay because the pressure within the cabin was at or close to what it should have been. In other words, even though the AAC was defective, it was defaulting to a reading which was close enough to the correct reading to produce a normal clone. It was only when there was something going on in or around the CR47 that the AAC would malfunction. Then the allowable margin of error was exceeded, and the cabin pressurized incorrectly. The result was an abnormal clone. Does this answer your question, Helmer?"

  "Yeah, it sounds like a very viable explanation. I guess there is only one way to test your hypothesis, Rollie. We need to run at least a couple dozen new clone tests with the good AAC and then run a few with the defective AAC."

  "You're right, Helmer. That's the only way we'll know for sure if the AAC is the root of our problems. But I got to tell you, I'm not looking forward to intentionally producing more defective and pathetic creatures."

  "None of us are. But I'm not sure we have a choice. It has to be done."

  Helmer looked back at Rollie who was now in deep thought about something. "What is it, Rollie?"

  Helmer's question finally registered with Rollie. He looked up and explained what he was thinking about. "There might be another way to prove the AAC was malfunctioning when the clones were abnormal."

  "What's that, Rollie?"

  "Claude, how many test mouse clones did you produce before one was successful?"

  "At least a dozen, Rollie."

  "Did you keep a log on all of them?"

  "You know me, Rollie. I make a log of everything I do, using the approved WCSM testing methodology."

  "Guys, we have Claude's log showing the dates and times he tried to regenerate a mouse clone. We know which ones were unsuccessful and which one turned out perfect. Why not compare his cloning log to the CR47 data recorder? The data recorder captures everything including the reading from the AAC gauge. We should be able to detect a pattern in faulty AAC readings when the clones were abnormal versus the normal one.

  "That seems like a reasonable thing to do. But it might take a lot more time than we have available."

  "You're right, Helmer. Backtracking through Claude's log and data reports will definitely be time-consuming." Rollie stared into the air at nothing. His thoughts were aimed at finding another way to get the information they needed without creating more creatures from Hell.

  "Well, think about this. Before we had Raul's people disable the recording system in the CR47 lab, we cloned several animals. Although most of them turned out abnormal, some of them were perfect specimens. As a matter of fact, my dog is one of the perfect clones. I wonder if Raul's system was positioned so it recorded what the AAC gauge was reading for each clone; good and bad. If we can retrieve those recordings and see the AAC gauge before and during each cloning test, we might be able to verify our hypothesis."

  "Other than the first cloned mouse, I had no idea you guys successfully cloned other animals."

  "No one did, Helmer. We couldn't tell anyone about the other successful clones because there were so many unsuccessful tests. We knew something was wrong with the CR47, but we didn't know what. And we were afraid that disclosing the successful clones would lead to premature human cloning which would have been a disaster. Even thinking about what human cloning would have produced before the CR47 was fixed sends shivers up and down my spine."

  "Wow, it sounds like there've been a lot of shenanigans going on behind the scenes."

  "Someday, I'll tell you the entire story. You won't believe what Claude and I had to do to delay the ReLife project, so it wasn't misused. Anyhow, we're wasting time. I think we should resurrect those recordings and see if they show close-ups of the AAC. Helmer, why don't you take this assignment? A fresh set of eyes looking at the recordings would be more objective than Claude or me looking at them.

  "No problem, Rollie. After we end this meeting, I'll go to Raul and see if he'll help find those recordings."

  "Good. They should be about seven or eight weeks ago. To tell you the truth, I've been surprised that Raul didn't find these recordings before now. If he did, he's kept quiet about them even though they prove the CR47 wasn't really broken."

  "Well, I'll
know immediately when I ask Raul to pull up the recordings if he has seen them before. Not that it makes a lot of difference now."

  "Okay, great, Helmer. In the meantime, Claude and I will go ahead with new clone tests. We can't afford to wait and see if you and Raul can find the recordings. Even if you find them, they might not show the AAC gauge well enough to read during the test clones."

  Rollie looked at his fellow scientists to see if they agreed with his plan. He could tell Helmer was keyed up and ready to start his assignment, but he wasn't sure if Claude felt the same way. There was something about Claude's facial expression which struck Rollie as odder than normal.

  "Claude, do you have anything to add?"

  Whatever Claude was daydreaming about evaporated with Rollie's question. He cleared the phlegm from his throat and snorted a couple of times before saying, "No, not a thing, Rollie. Let's get on with it. The sooner we prove what caused the CR47 to malfunction, the better my life is going to be."

  Rollie and Helmer didn't know exactly what Claude meant by this, but figured it couldn't be anything too exciting. His reputation as an odd, little nerd who dressed and acted weird was reason enough to ignore comments about his personal life. If anything, Claude probably meant that he was looking forward again to getting eight hours of sleep each night. But this time, Claude's comment was more ominous than Rollie or Helmer could have guessed.

  "Okay, good! Claude, you start collecting more host samples to test. Helmer, you track down the recordings we spoke about, and I need to go and talk to a woman about an ape."

  Helmer started laughing thinking Rollie was screwing around. This was the second time Claude heard Rollie mention apes and monkeys, so he found nothing humorous about the comment. But he did wonder about what Rollie was up to and why he was being so secretive about it.

  "Claude, lighten up, my man. Rollie is only trying to get a date for tonight."

  This time, Rollie laughed at Helmer's wisecrack. Claude's strait-laced, solemn facial expression didn't change one bit.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  The Monkey Woman

  "Ingrid, have you got the communication to the Congo set up?"

  "Yes, Mr. Sweats. Ms. Weeks is expecting your call in exactly..." Ingrid looked at the time on her Communications and Production Station (CPS) to get the right time. "In exactly twenty minutes."

  When Rollie returned from his morning briefing with Claude and Helmer he found his executive assistant, Ingrid, preparing for the day's activities starting with his call to the monkey scientist in equatorial Africa.

  "Ingrid, tell me her background again. I don't want to insult her or screw up this conversation."

  "Let me pull it up." Rollie took a chair next to her so he could look over her shoulder as he sipped on some weird coffee-based drink. Before she started, Rollie wondered whatever happened to black coffee like Grandma LeeLee served each morning with a healthy batch of corn cakes, hog fat, and syrup. He could still smell the rich aroma of her coffee as it percolated on the stove. But the best part was finding a few coffee grounds at the bottom of each cup. He loved to roll the grounds around in his mouth before washing them down with the last swallow. He promised himself to one day enjoy another of her delicious breakfast meals after his life returned to normal, if that day ever came.

  Ingrid began to read and summarize out loud Weeks' background and experience when it came up on the CPS halo screen.

  "Ms. Weeks is 67 years old. Her first name is Calderon. She was born in the old United Kingdom and was the only child of Trish and Thurmond Weeks, scientists who attempted to find a cure for the FISS plague. Being one of the few girls born during the plague made Calderon a celebrity. Her parents were constantly harassed for interviews and special requests from the government to examine the child. It got to the point where Calderon was spending more time at government medical and research facilities than at home with her parents. Finally, Thurmond Weeks decided this unwanted attention was intolerable. He moved the family out of London to a very remote area of the world.

  Providing the little girl with a normal childhood experience was the primary reason for moving. But spreading the Christian gospel was more important. The Weeks were true believers in the Christian religion and felt it was their responsibility in life to make sure everyone heard the word of Jesus. Unfortunately, the anti-religion sentiment of the World Council was very strong. Openly preaching any religious doctrine was considered heresy against the state and its citizens. In a few short years, the government would legally ban all types of religious promotion and activity. Any religious followers and advocates defying this edict were penalized with the loss of world credits."

  Ingrid stopped and looked over to Rollie. "With me so far?"

  "Go ahead. We only have a few more minutes."

  "Okay, this is where things get dicey. It seems the Weeks family didn't do their homework very well before moving to tropical Africa and ended up walking right into a tribal war. There were several tribes killing each other off as quickly as they could. Some thought the conflict was economically based due to the recent discovery of platinum in the area. Others thought it was a continuation of tribal feuds going back hundreds of years.

  Anyway, Calderon's parents were killed within thirty days of relocating to the former African state known as the Congo. Calderon, who was ten at the time, was taken in by one of the warlords and made one of his concubines. This report doesn't say explicitly but implies that the fair skin, blonde Calderon was a huge prize for the warlord. Surprisingly, Calderon blended in quite well with the warlord's extended family. Over time she became the number one female in his household.

  The tribal war eventually tapered off and Calderon turned her attention and inquisitive nature to the local wildlife. She had an immediate affection for the apes and monkeys of the area. This became her love and specialty. She spent the next four decades researching, and at times, living with these creatures.

  She was very lucky that the population of all the different monkeys and apes in the area was on the upswing. As a reward for her loyalty, the warlord imposed a death penalty on anyone caught poaching these animals. Also, the FISS plague reduced the human population which in turn led to less farming and harvesting of the forest. The jungle slowly expanded, which gave the primates more room to roam and forage for food.

  Calderon became an expert in primate behavior and discovered that the FISS plague did not affect their species. Their male-female birth rates maintained a balanced ratio and their overall birth rate increased as the habitat expanded. With little formal education, Calderon went to work to discover why humans were affected by the FISS plague when monkeys and apes were not. In an ironic twist of fate, she ended up carrying on her parents' professional work to find a cure for FISS."

  Ingrid took a drink, caught her breath and went on. "Here's what you might be very interested in. The locals in the area swear that Calderon can talk to the apes. They don't mean that she has an intuitive relationship with them, or they have learned a few hand signals from her. They truly believe that she can communicate, by voice, with her primate friends. Many people have seen her grunting and groaning back and forth with them as she displays the same body movements.

  "There have been countless reports of Calderon asking her primate friends to do this or that and they comply. It's as if they understand her requests perfectly. In one situation, Calderon asked and then demanded an alpha male ape to make amends with another male ape who was ostracized from the troop. The alpha male ape whined and complained like a little kid but eventually welcomed the rogue ape back into his family. Regardless of whether this is true or not, everyone agrees that she is closer to apes than humans.

  "Well, that's about it, boss. The only other thing is that she never married even though her warlord partner died almost twenty years ago. Interesting woman, don't you think?"

  Rollie was in deep thought about Weeks' bio. He wondered whether this woman might help discover the expectations and limitation
s of the CR47. There was no question she had the background he was looking for, but the part about her parents being religious missionaries concerned him. Even though they died when she was quite young, she was probably indoctrinated to believe that only a divine spirit can create life. The question was whether she still held this belief, and could she make allowances for the benefit of mankind? In the next hour, he would find out if her strict religious upbringing would find cloning morally objectionable. If so, could he convince the monkey woman that God created life, whereas cloning only extended it?

  "Uh, what did you say, Ingrid? I was thinking about something."

  Ingrid smiled and thought it best not to make the same lame observation again. "I said, you better get in your office, so I can make the communication with Ms. Weeks."

  Rollie walked into his office and checked his appearance in the private bathroom mirror. He looked a little tired but good enough. There was no reason to look like a male model. After all, his conversation was with a woman who knew more about primates than humans.

  "Good morning, Ms. Weeks. I hope I'm not interrupting your day too much. They tell me you are the world's most noted authority on primates and that's exactly why I am calling. I need your help, Ms. Weeks."

  Rollie hoped he didn't hit her with too much information in his opening greeting. He guessed that being upfront and honest with a woman of science and research would lead to her cooperation.