by M. C. Miller
Colin flinched and redirected off topic. “At my level, I can only deliver so much.”
Faye failed to steady her nerves but her voice was strong. “Impress it on your bosses – if they want to solve this, they need both of them. Now take me home. I’ll come back when my terms are met.”
She stormed off in the direction of the Landing Zone.
Colin stood flatfooted for a second then followed her into the elevator.
During the ride to laboratory level, the silence between them only deepened.
Chapter 24
NovoSenectus Corporate Business Park
Hyderabad, India
Standing at his ninth-story office window, Eugene Mass looked down on the unexpected arrival with a mixture of confusion and annoyance. A black Suburban with tinted windows trailed the limousine along the circular drive. Security cameras pivoted at the corners of the central administration building’s rooftop and tracked progress of the cars nearing the south entrance.
The guards had called ahead to give Mass advance notice. He had done nothing with the lead time other than wait. Without more detail, there was nothing else to do.
When forward motion stopped, suited bodyguards exited the Suburban and took up point positions around the limousine. The limo driver scurried back to open the rear door. From the back seat stepped Mass’ wife Leah in a uncharacteristic hurry. Obviously, the energy given her steps belied a matter too important to heed doctor’s orders to stay at home and rest.
With everything in his day, the unanticipated visit forced Mass to reconsider the decision to bring his wife with him from Brussels. Leah had joined him in India so corporate scientists could treat her mysterious chronic fatigue. She had struggled with it since completing GenLET treatments. Doctors had followed up with tests and trial prescriptions as much as she wanted. All the while, they informed Eugene they believed the ailment was psychosomatic.
Not dissuaded, Leah was certain her symptoms proved she was having an adverse reaction to all she had gone through to secure a greatly extended lifespan.
As Mass watched Leah strut towards the building’s entrance, he reflected on the next hundred years. After receiving GenLET, ’til death do us part took on challenging new potentials and problems. He sighed at confirmation of a reality he suspected but had hoped to avoid – even the gods have issues, after all.
He turned from the window and glanced across his work desk without inspiration. Moving on, he stepped into a sitting area on the other side of the room. He fixed himself a drink and waited for the inevitable. He could only guess what new emergency had prompted Leah to need face-time with him.
A female voice sounded on the intercom.
“Mr. Mass, your wife is on her way up to see you.”
Eugene took a sip of scotch. “Very well. Hold all calls and appointments until further notice.”
“Yes, sir.”
Two sips later, the door opened.
In came Leah with a distraught but determined face.
“Eugene…,” she gave him a brief hug. “I’m sorry; this couldn’t wait.”
“You couldn’t call?”
Leah froze as if affronted. “Aren’t I welcome?”
Already exasperated, Mass closed his eyes. “All I meant was, it might have been better to rest.” He opened his eyes to find Leah settling on the couch. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m beside myself. Haven’t you heard?”
Mass restrained the sarcasm of asking if those statements were meant together. “I’ve been a little busy.”
“I told you something was wrong. I should have listened to my intuition.”
“Hold on, now – start at the beginning.”
Her eyes filled with tears. “It’s Jayden!”
Eugene felt her concern and drew near. He sat on the couch and took her hand.
“What about Jayden?” Mass expected to hear that his nine-year-old grandson had suffered an accident.
Leah was overcome by all the emotion bottled up during the limo ride.
“You’ve got to put everything on hold! Something isn’t right!”
“Put what on hold? What are you talking about?”
“GenLET…3rd Protocol. We can’t be sure of any of it.”
“GenLET is out. We’ve already given or sold it to so many. What does that have to do with Jayden?” Mass held her by the shoulders to calm her. “Just tell me. It’s all right. When did this start?”
“I went to the clinic; I had palpitations.”
“This morning?”
“A while ago…I just came from there.”
“Go on…”
“I was in the office, telling them how I felt when they got a call.”
“About Jayden?”
Leah nodded. “The results came back from his post-therapy tests.”
“Post GenLET…,” Mass confirmed.
“Something isn’t right genetically. They found an anomaly.”
“What exactly?”
“Something’s abnormal.” Leah bent forward and sobbed. “They say he’s sterile. He’ll never have children.”
Mass took a moment to let the news sink in. He settled back.
“That makes no sense. How do they know this? He’s only nine years old…”
Leah’s temper fought her grief. “Something’s gone wrong with GenLET. I just know it.”
“What did the clinic say?”
“What do you expect? They aren’t going to take the blame.”
“Just tell me what they said!”
“They said no way. It’s not their fault.”
“What’s the reason? Did they explain?”
“Of course! They compared genetic material taken from Jayden before GenLET therapy and matched it with his test results. They found the same genetic variance before and after. They claim that proves Jayden was sterile before he got GenLET.”
“Then GenLET didn’t cause it. If they had this before, why didn’t they see it?”
“According to them, they only do this kind of exhaustive review when they confirm the therapy is complete. They said there’s no reason to do the same review before treatment. It’s a comparative test; before, there’s nothing to compare.”
“You don’t accept that?”
“I know what I feel. There has to be more to it. How can they explain it away so fast? It doesn’t seem right.”
“Why, because you want it to be so much more?”
“The best thing to do is put everything on hold. We have to take time to look into this. We need to be sure.”
“It’s not that easy.” Mass stood and sauntered to the window.
“Of course it is!”
“I know you’re upset, but let’s think this through…”
“A lot of GenLET research got used in 3rd Protocol.” Leah’s statement was an accusation.
“We’ve already gone over this. Neither one of us are scientists. We can’t tell them how it works. If they’re certain GenLET isn’t involved, we have to trust the evidence.”
“I have chronic fatigue for a reason…now this.”
“The doctors say the fatigue has more to do with you than anything.”
“It’s not all in my mind.”
“Nobody else receiving GenLET reports the same symptoms.”
“GenLET is something new. It could go wrong in each person differently.”
“Leah, please…I don’t have time for this. There’s too much to do.”
“Your grandson is sterile! Aren’t you the least bit concerned how that happened?”
“How does any birth defect happen?”
“Birth defect! Now who’s jumping to conclusions? You said you’re not the scientist, so stop all of this until they have the evidence.”
“I’m sorry but there’s too much at stake to put everything on hold.”
“The schedule is ours to make; no one’s forcing us to do anything right now.”
“Janis Insworth has been taken into custody
in France. They’re preparing to extradite her back here.”
Leah was confused. “But that’s good news.”
“Not necessarily. We didn’t get to the laptop first.”
“But they’ll bring it back with her, won’t they?”
“Yes, but we don’t know who’s been looking at it. You know the French won’t pass up the chance to examine it.”
“What was she doing in France anyway?”
“Trying to make a deal with André Bolard.”
“My God!”
“All the more reason why we must accelerate the schedule, not slow it down.”
“It’s that damned memo again!” Leah stood and paced. Anger dried her tears.
“It’s the only thing that can hurt us.”
“If you hadn’t been so sloppy to let Riya get a hold of it...”
“She was more resourceful than I thought.”
Leah stood and paced. “That wasn’t it. The whole plan was flawed. Whatever possessed you to think that baiting her was a good idea in the first place?”
“I needed to find out who she was passing information to, where it was going, and what they were using it for. I needed to give her something to find. Why not make use of it?”
“She was a corporate spy. She should’ve been handed over to the authorities.”
“She was our top scientist. Losing her meant GenLET might not get finished.”
“So you fed her lies that only complicated things – especially when some of the lies were true! Admit it, you were trying to be too clever.”
Mass turned from the window to confront his wife. “If it wasn’t for that one memo, we wouldn’t be arguing about this. Nothing else Riya transferred to GeLixCo can hurt us. Nothing on the laptop matters but the memo. For chrissakes, it has my initials on it – it names Javier, Oliver, Labon, and the lab in Kansas.”
“What about the rest? You put out there the whole plan!”
“It mentions 3rd Protocol – so what? There’s nothing going on in Austria and there’s no deal with the Chinese. The white papers on population collapse were published years ago from think tanks funded by The Group. Anyone using that information will be crying wolf. If anything, The Group will have to duck and over. That’ll delay their 2nd Protocol which is want we want. The exposure on us will only protect our plan. If someone else comes after us with conspiracy theories, they’ll look ridiculous. Mixing the truth with lies can only insulate us.”
Leah looked to the floor. “You never found out why Riya betrayed us…”
“No sense going into that.” Mass stood his ground. “We’ll never know. After 3rd Protocol, it won’t matter.”
Leah steamed silently for a moment. “What are you going to do about the memo?”
“There’s not much I can do. We have to assume it’s already out there or soon will be. If we had gotten to the laptop first, we’d have more maneuvering room. As it is, I see no choice but to give Oliver the go-code.”
“With all that’s going on, that’s your only concern?”
“The crisis isn’t going away. If we wait longer, more can go wrong.”
“And what about Jayden? What about our dynasty carrying forward?”
Mass was brutally pragmatic. “His parents now have hundreds of years together. Lots of time. We’ll have other grandchildren.”
Leah looked up and stared at her husband. “You’re no scientist, but somehow you know for a fact that the same birth defect won’t happen again? You’d rather rush forward than wait and be sure.”
Mass couldn’t dispute her point. It was easier to placate. “I’ll have the lab look into it. If you want, I’ll have every GenLET recipient tested. Will that make you feel better?”
Leah felt no closure. “Don’t do it to make me feel better. Do it because it’s too important not to get right. This is our future – and now there’s so much more of it.”
Leah waited for an answer that didn’t come. She took a step closer to Mass.
“If you get this wrong, we’re going to have to live with it a long, long time.” Leah headed for the door. “Think about that.”
With Leah gone, Mass shuffled back to his desk and sat down. Motionless for a minute, he let the conversation settle and his business focus return. Before him was keyboard and monitor. On impulse, he did a search on his name. Dozens of news articles and blogs returned, most detailed the arrest of Janis Insworth; they named Mass only peripherally as her boss at NovoSenectus.
As Mass scrolled down the search results, one article from a Parisian scandal sheet caught his eye. He clicked on it and read a translation. Scanning the text, he caught the gist of the article’s salaciousness – and accuracy.
“…Janis Insworth worked alongside Riya Basu, the murdered Nobel laureate,
…the laptop was found in a safety deposit box not far from where the GenLET
scientist met with a representative of New Class Order,
…Indian authorities claim the laptop contains sensitive intellectual capital from
NovoSenectus and belonged to Malcolm Stowe, a security agent for the
biotech firm who died under suspicious circumstances,
…a source within the Hyderabad Police headquarters says Eugene Mass, owner
of NovoSenectus, is anxious to get the laptop returned,
…the Central Directorate of Internal Intelligence is in possession of the laptop,
…so far there’s only wild speculation about what secrets the laptop
might contain.”
Mass reread passages from the article. With each pass over them, he couldn’t help but feel anxious about the way the course of human events stewed in its own self-serving pettiness. It would take so little, something so minor, to interfere with all he had worked for.
Meanwhile, The Anthropocene Dilemma was waiting to be solved.
A calmness of conviction came over him. He was suddenly imbued with the righteous perspective of a reluctant savior. Humanity and the planet needed him. Above all else, he wanted to live to see a healthier earth, a better humanity.
The conversation with Leah receded. It seemed long ago and far away.
He opened a desk drawer and reached in for a private phone.
Before he pressed a speed dial key, there was the slightest pause.
Leaning back in his swivel rocker, he waited for his man to answer.
“Yes, what is it?” It was Javier.
Mass was firm. “Pass it along…green, green, green.”
From Javier, a moment of hesitation, the shock that this was real.
With a press of a thumb, Mass ended the call. No answer was needed.
He dropped the phone into the drawer, stood and made strides to the window.
The black suburban and limo were in the distance.
Mass watched them disappear.
Filled with a rush of passion and purpose, he raised his sight and squinted at the all-powerful sun. The future was now. The deed was done.
The New World Harmony had just begun.
Chapter 25
Lufthansa Flight 2261
Franz Josef Strauss International Airport, Munich
Janis Insworth looked away from the porthole window and braced for landing. Descending out of a grey sky, the Canadair Regional Jet 700 touched down on runway 26L shortly before 10:30 a.m. The flight was on time. Janis felt out of place.
For a moment, she closed her eyes and absorbed being engulfed by the energy around her. The roar of back-thrusting engines and the forward pull from the plane’s braking both felt as if they surged from a protected place inside of her. Strapped in her seat, she reflected on a regret, rawness and longing that ached for release.
If only she could stop or reverse so much of what had happened.
If only she could prevent so much of what she feared might soon be.
But everything around her resisted. The unyielding momentum of events felt fateful, at times fatalistic. Despite determination and clarity, at moments
it was easier to doubt, to relent that one was probably helpless to change the course of events, to exist merely as another powerless transient along for the ride.
Her muscles tightened against the feeling even as the roar around her subsided.
Alongside her in Seat 9C, a French air marshal had spent much of the 90-minute flight from Marseille in silence. He remained all-business and duty-bound as her armed escort. His name was Paul but all Janis cared about was what awaited her after being in his custody for three interconnecting flights back to India.
Janis forced deeper breaths. The excited rush of landing had calmed. The plane turned and started a slow taxi towards the terminal gate. Janis anticipated this first layover with unusual dread, enough so that it sparked her intuition. Something wasn’t right. She forced herself to settle back. Focusing on the mundane, she hoped a calmer perspective would prevail.
“How long will we be here?” She didn’t look at Paul.
He idly glanced past her out the window. “Not long. Next flight’s at noon.”
“That’s the one to Doha?”
A nod. “Five and a half hours. The longest leg.”
She sighed and stared up at the fasten seatbelt indicator. She remembered the rest; it stuck in her mind. After another layover, twice as long, the flight out of Doha would put them into Hyderabad at 3:30 in the morning. The thought of it ran cold. There was something about arriving in the middle of the night that didn’t sit well. Not where she was going. Not when she knew who wanted her there and why.
She asked the question she’d avoided up to now. “Do you have the laptop?”
For the first time in over an hour, Paul looked her in the eye. He studied her interest with aloofness edged with wariness. “That’s none of your concern now.”
Janis didn’t pursue it. She looked out the porthole and ignored him. Thoughts of Eugene Mass overwhelmed anything else. On the surface, French and Indian officials would make her issue appear to be a police matter. But she knew what was really behind the effort to return her to India. It would never be enough for Mass to simply get the laptop back. He had unfinished business with her.
