Lyon's Legacy: Catalyst Chronicles, Book One

by sandra ulbrich almazan

  Dad’s image appeared above my handheld. It’d been so long since I’d seen him that I was shocked by how weary he looked, with sunken-in eyes and iron-gray hair. He was too young to look that old; he was only in his forties. “Hi, Jo.” Even his voice sounded defeated. “I know you might never listen to this, but I keep hoping someday you’ll respond. If you’re listening, I’m sorry I didn’t do a better job of being your father.” He hesitated. “You’ve probably heard by now we lost your mother. We couldn’t stand each other in the end, but she was the first woman I ever loved. Even now, it still felt like I lost part of myself with her….” He sighed. “I just wanted to find out how you were holding up. You were always closer to her; I’m sure this isn’t easy for you….”

  I paused the holo. “It’s about time you realized that, you…you…” For once, I didn’t have the heart to call him names. He hadn’t been the best dad in the world, but that was a problem generations in the making. Time for a Lyon—me—to step up and be a better parent. Maybe that meant I had to look backward to my dad instead of just forward to my soon-to-be-son. I resumed playing the holo.

  “But if there’s anything I can do for you, or if you just want to talk, message me. You know how to contact me if you want to. Maybe you don’t, but as Grandpa said, the future starts now.” He smiled ironically; Sean had said that in one of his final interviews. Dad looked directly into the holorecorder. “Love, Dad. Ian Lyon out.”

  The holo ended. I stared at empty space for several moments before playing Sean’s “Father, Farewell” song and thinking about his performance at the White Knight. I didn’t cry this time, but my handheld trembled. I had to place it on my desk so I could record my own message. I stared at my handheld for a few minutes before I was able to reply. “Hi, Dad. Yeah, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?” I choked back a laugh. “I’ve got a lot to tell you.”

  I told him about George, my work on the Sagan, and my encounter with Great-Granddad. Then I paused the recording. Did I dare tell him about my plans to mother Sean’s clone? If he told my uncle, he’d find some way to take the child. But Dad was the only person I knew with enough credits and clout to help me. Finally I took a risk and revealed my plan. “I know Uncle Jackass won’t like this; he’ll try to take the boy from me,” I said at the end. “But he needs a chance to grow up normally. We know firsthand how hard it is to be Sean’s descendants; let’s not make this kid go through that. Dad, if you can manage a miracle and change Uncle Jackass’s mind, or block him somehow, I’d really appreciate it.” I took a deep breath. “I haven’t been the best daughter either, Dad, but I still love you. Joanna Lyon out.”

  I sent it immediately, before I could change my mind.

  Chapter Nine

  I was glad I sent Dad my message before I started the hormone treatments. They were as bad as Dr. Allnan had said they’d be. The shots had to be given every twelve hours, and they made my back sore. I used pillows and wedges to keep me on my stomach at night. I gave up caffeine—one of the worst sacrifices I’ve ever made, and I bloated like a retired supermodel who’d just discovered chocolate. I could deal with all that, but my moods were out of control. One day in the lab when I discovered one of my cultures had been contaminated, tears gathered in my eyes. I refused to cry over something so trivial, even if it did throw off my experiment. I blinked hard, then threw the Petri dish into an autoclave bag with enough force to shatter the plastic.

  “Just wait, George,” Lizabeth said after she returned a tray of cultures to the incubator room. “You think she’s bad now, wait until she’s eight months pregnant. She’ll get stuck between the benches, and she’ll bawl like a baby!” She winked at me, but I didn’t respond. By the time I was that far along, I’d be back on Earth, my trip a memory.

  A look of alarm crossed George’s face. “I hope we’re stocked up on ice cream,” he said. I wasn’t sure if he was kidding or not.

  “Screw both of you.” I slammed the autoclave door. “You think it’s so funny, Lizabeth, why don’t you get pregnant?”

  Her expression became serious. “Actually, Olivia and I have been talking about getting inseminated. If we’re going to have kids, we should do it before we get too old. We can’t decide which one of us should carry the baby.”

  “Why not both of you? Misery loves company.”

  “Maybe we’ll do that,” Lizabeth said.

  “That’d be nice.” It was too bad we wouldn’t be able to keep in touch real-time.

  The next morning, after Dr. Allnan finished examining me, she said, “Well, it looks like we’re ready for the harvest. Feel up for it? It shouldn’t be too bad. I’ll give you a light sedative and local anesthesia, but you won’t feel like working afterwards.”

  I notified Ferdie, who wished me luck. They sedated me and placed me in front of a scanner. I watched the monitor as a tech stuck a syringe in me. He delicately probed several follicles, popping them like balloons as he sucked out my eggs. “We got eight, Dr. Allnan,” he said after he finished.

  That was one of Sean’s lucky numbers; I knew it was probably a coincidence, but I still hoped it was a good sign.

  Ferdie kept me scrambling in the lab the next three days, and Dr. Allnan refused to tell me anything. When she finally summoned me, George came along to hear the news.

  “One egg wasn’t usable, and four of them didn’t divide after we added the foreign DNA.” She showed me the lab reports. “But the last three eggs are developing nicely. We even introduced some mitochondria from the samples, so the child will carry both yours and Sean’s. If you’re ready, we can inject the embryos into your uterus right now.”

  “Three of them?” I raised my eyebrows. “I don’t want triplets! One Lyon is more than a handful as it is.”

  “That you are,” George said. I stuck my tongue out at him, but he grinned.

  “Odds are they won’t all implant correctly,” Dr. Allnan explained. “We do this to increase the chances of a successful pregnancy.”

  George and I looked at each other; it struck me there’d be no turning back after this point. “Well?” I asked him.

  “It’s not up to me; I’m not the one who’s going to be pregnant for the next nine months. Are you sure you want this, Jo?”

  I only hesitated for a few seconds. “Yeah. Let’s do it.”

  The procedure was even easier than the egg harvest: a local anesthetic, a carefully aimed injection, and that was it. George held my hand as I lay still for half an hour afterwards. I put my hand protectively over my stomach as we left.

  “Why don’t we go somewhere private for dinner?” he asked.

  “Sounds good.” Someone could jostle me in the mess hall and dislodge an embryo. I told myself that was silly, but I had someone else to worry about now besides me.

  George led me to a holoroom marked “Reserved.” Inside was a simulation of a beach. Deep blue water lapped the beach on three sides, while the fourth side was a jungle complete with monkeys and brightly colored birds scampering among the tall trees. In the center of the beach stood a picnic table; steak and chocolate smells wafted from it.

  I stepped forward, taking it all in. It was warm enough to make me wish I’d packed a bikini. The sand didn’t crunch under my feet, but if I focused on the sights and sounds of the holo, it was a convincing illusion. “Did you program all this, George?”

  His ears turned pink. “I wish I had. This is one of the preprogrammed holos.”

  “It’s still lovely.”

  He offered me his arm, and we strolled around the beach. The view shifted as we moved. He finally led me back to the table and attempted to pull out a bench, but it was attached to the table. I slid in and looked up at him. He’d never done anything like this before. Either this was a distraction from all the medical tests and procedures I’d subjected myself to lately, or else something major was about to happen. I had a feeling it was the latter. Even so, I held my breath as George sank to his knees in front of me.

  “Joanna.” He look
ed up at me, eyes wide as if he’d forgotten what to say. He gulped as if he needed to recapture the words. “When I first met you back at the beginning of this trip, I thought you were the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. And as I’ve gotten to know you, I’ve seen that you’re just as beautiful inside as well. Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”

  I sat there, speechless. I finally found my tongue. “But...but I might be pregnant.”

  I don’t think he was expecting that answer; he looked at me as if I’d asked him what DNA stood for. “Um, I was there, Jo.”

  “But not in that way.” I took his hands between mine. “It doesn’t matter to you that it’s not yours?”

  “He’ll be ours. We’ll find some way to raise him—together.” He lifted an eyebrow. “If you want me with you, that is.”

  I leaned forward and looked him in the eyes. “Oh, yes,” I whispered.

  He beamed for a moment, but then his smile faded.

  “Something wrong?” I asked. I hoped he hadn’t had a change of heart.

  “It’s just...I wasn’t expecting to meet someone like you on this trip, and I don’t have an engagement ring.” He squeezed my hand. “I promise I’ll find one as soon as we land on Earth.”

  I couldn’t resist teasing him. “You planned all this, but you couldn’t find a placeholder ring?”

  “Like what?” He patted his pants pockets. “All I have on me is my handheld and some autoclave tape....”

  He pulled the roll out of his pocket. The inner core would have fit around two of my fingers. He looked back and forth between the tape and my hand.

  “Don’t tell me you have an idea,” I said.

  “I won’t do it if you think it’s stupid.”

  “Just show me what you have in mind.”

  He tore off a piece of tape, folded it over itself to cover the adhesive, and played around with it until he molded it around my ring finger. I couldn’t help staring at it.

  George’s mouth drooped. “You don’t like it?”

  It itched, but I resisted the urge to scratch my finger. “I love it. Just as long as you don’t expect me to autoclave my hand.”

  “Let’s see how heat-resistant it is,” he said in a rough voice.

  His kiss was hot, but dinner was cold by the time we got around to eating.

  * * *

  I was supposed to take it easy for the next ten days, but I still managed to stay busy. George and I planned to marry as soon as we returned to our own Earth. Trying to arrange details when we’d just passed through the wormhole was more complicated than visiting the TwenCen. Ferdie and I also discussed my future; he was so pleased about the way I’d handled the mission that he wanted to keep me in the lab. “This way, I make sure George sticks around too,” he said. “A happy couple is more likely to stay in space than someone still looking for love.”

  Even a wedding, a dissertation, and a new job couldn’t distract me from constantly wondering if I was pregnant. What if the procedure failed? I’d have to go through the whole damn process all over again, maybe several times. And if I wasn’t pregnant by the time I returned to Earth, Uncle Jackass might refuse to give me any rights over the child.

  Day eleven post-implantation, I returned to the medical lab as soon as Dr. Allnan was on duty. “Can I test yet?”

  She smiled. “Yes, impatient one.”

  “Great.” I looked around the exam room. “Where’s a pregnancy test?”

  She plugged a needle into her medical handheld. “I was planning to do a blood test since it’ll be more sensitive, but if you want to pee in a cup like generations of other women, you can do that too.”

  I was over-prepared for the traditional test; it was hard to keep still enough for her to withdraw a few milliliters of blood. I rushed into the head and relieved myself into the specially coated cup. I forced myself not to look until I’d washed my hands. A giant red “P” had appeared on the bottom.

  My hands trembled as I picked up the cup, then pushed the door open. Dr. Allnan had assured me the false positive rate for modern tests was virtually nil, but I wanted to make sure. But all the confirmation I needed showed in her grin.

  “Congratulations, Joanna, you’re pregnant.” She held out her handheld to me, but I couldn’t make out the results. “I can’t normally say this so early in a pregnancy, but…it’s a boy.”

  Chapter Ten

  “Given any thought to a name yet?” George asked later that evening. We sat on my cot, glasses of non-alcoholic wine in our hands.

  “No Sean or John names,” I replied immediately. “I don’t even want names that start with J or S. We have to treat this child as a unique person from the start.” I looked sideways at my soon-to-be husband. “Though we could name him after you…”

  He shook his head. “It’ll be too confusing having two Georges around.”

  I was determined to honor my George in some way, though. “What’s your middle name? You never told me.”

  “Paul.”

  I remembered one of the musicians who’d performed with Sean was named Paul. Sean had encountered other Pauls during his life, including two more musicians and a journalist, but the name was common enough not to have strong Sean associations. “Paul Harrison...Paul Lyon Harrison,” I said, testing the name. It sounded good to me. With a name like that, Paul could be whomever he wanted to be, not my uncle’s creature.

  George nodded as if the matter was settled. “To Paul, then.”

  We toasted our very young son. George finished his wine first and set the glass aside, then faced me again. “So, when are you going to tell your uncle? And what will you say?”

  I scowled, the sweet afternotes of the wine becoming harsh. “I’d rather not tell him anything until I have to. Why not just walk off the shuttle and show him my belly?”

  George’s voice sharpened slightly. “You know this is only half the battle, Jo. He could still sue you and the doctors if you don’t turn over the DNA sequence—or even the child—to him.”

  “That’s why I can’t say anything now. It’ll just give him more time to hire lawyers.”

  “Perhaps we’d better hire one of our own, then.”

  At least he was going to stick with me. I squeezed his hand. “When we get close enough to our Earth, I’ll contact someone.”

  I didn’t remind him I was a graduate student with more loans than lucre. I couldn’t afford a law student, let alone someone clever enough to compete with Jackass’s sharks. I had to find a way to bring Paul back onto the Sagan with me. If Jackass wanted my son, he’d have to travel across space to get him.

  * * *

  Between working on my dissertation—a project comparing how well a computer program to measure the genetic diversity of a species did against direct genetic tests—and coping with my pregnancy, the return trip to Earth felt much shorter than the outgoing one. Or perhaps it had something to do with my morning sickness during the first trimester. I ate crackers before getting out of bed; that helped, but it was still hard to muster an appetite. I went to bed early to counter the fatigue. I worked as hard as I could in the afternoons, though. I didn’t want Ferdie to think I was lazy.

  “Using the head again, Jo?” he asked one morning. “What’s it going to be like when you’re eight months along? Shall we just move your equipment in there, or will you let us use it too?”

  By this point, I was in my middle trimester and past my morning sickness. I didn’t think I was using the head more than anyone else. But before I could defend myself, Olivia looked up from the sequencer she was repairing. “Hey, Ferdie, did Lizabeth tell you both of us are going to get inseminated during layover?”

  He paled. “Three pregnant women, in the same lab, at once? Mein lieber Gott, nein!” He rushed into his office and shut the door. Olivia and I looked at each other, then laughed.

  I turned twenty-five a month before we were supposed to arrive on Earth. A message arrived from Dad while I was reviewing my data. He had shadows under
his eyes, but his smile seemed warm. “Happy birthday, my daughter. I can’t tell you how much it meant to me to hear from you. I can hardly wait to hear more about your visit with Sean—and this George guy. I still find it hard to believe you’re going to be a mother when I keep picturing you as a little girl.” He paused. “I’ve tried talking to Jack about his project, but he insists on going through with it.” Another long pause. “We’ll discuss it when you return. I’m pretty busy with something else. Looking forward to seeing you soon. Love, Ian Lyon.”

  I listened again, hoping I’d misheard. That was it? This was the most important thing I’d ever done, and he was too busy with some unnamed project to help me? I shouldn’t have bothered contacting him. I rested my head on my arms, suddenly drained. I could be going through all of this for nothing.

  George shook my shoulder. “Tired, hon? Or is something wrong?”

  I played my dad’s message for him. He looked at me as if he didn’t understand. “Is he always this busy?”

  “How would I know when I’ve barely spoken to him in the last seven years?” I shoved my handheld away. “He’s letting me down—again.”

  “Maybe it’s not as bad as you think. Maybe he’s got his own plan and doesn’t want to tell you in case someone intercepts the message.”

  That was so far-fetched I couldn’t even smile.

  “It’ll be OK, Jo. I promise. Don’t you have a doctor appointment?” He grinned. “Maybe we’ll get to see an ultrasound this time.”

  I dragged myself next door, but Dr. Allnan seemed distracted. She only gave us a brief glimpse of our little blob before continuing her exam.

  “The baby’s fine,” she said. “But I got a message from Golden Helix this morning. They weren’t pleased we took the initiative from them, but they were very interested in our success. They want to meet with you when we return.”