by Bill Myers
“Up a little…there you go.”
Besides his athletic build and thick, red hair, Wolff was also known for his perfectly trimmed and manicured nails. He wasn’t a neat freak; he just preferred things tidy. Even his workstation, that five-foot area of personal lab counter each researcher staked out as his or her own, was uncustomarily clean.
He also liked to shower. A couple times a day. “If you knew the mites and microbes crawling around on your skin,” he joked, “you’d be showering, too.”
Wolff was as fastidious with his research as he was with his personal hygiene. That’s why he worked so well with Murkoski. Where Murkoski would race through a study, impatient over the details, Wolff would remain behind, cleaning up, verifying, and triple-checking everything. If there was ever a scientific Odd Couple, it was Wolff’s Felix to Murkoski’s Oscar.
“Thanks, Freddy.” He patted the grass beside him, signaling for Freddy to step down. The animal obeyed, but not before giving one more playful hop.
“All right, you!” Wolff rolled over and tried to catch him, but the animal was too fast. Freddy ran off screaming in mock panic, his mouth opened wide while keeping his teeth covered with his lips. This was the “play expression” for baboons. It made no difference what noise or gesture they made — just as long as those needle-like canines were covered, it was all in play. And Freddy loved to play. The swings, the gym set, the tree, the slide, they were all fine. But baboons are social creatures, and no amount of toys compare to a good game of tag or roll-and-tumble with another animal.
Before Wolff could sit up, Freddy raced in from behind and gave him a good slap in the ribs. Wolff shouted in surprise and lunged for him but missed again. Freddy ran off screaming in delight, obviously hoping Wolff would follow.
“I can’t right now,” Wolff said, rising to his feet and brushing off the grass. “I’ve fooled around enough for one day. Maybe I’ll stop by for dinner.”
Freddy responded by racing at him full tilt, screaming all the way. But instead of ducking or running, Wolff turned back toward him — just in time to catch the animal leaping directly at him. The impact sent Wolff staggering backwards until man and baboon both crashed onto the grass, Freddy hooting in delight, Wolff laughing in spite of himself. “Come on, boy. I’m serious! I’ve got to go.”
But Freddy continued the wrestling and tumbling as long as possible, chortling the whole time.
“Freddy! Come on now, Freddy.” At last Wolff was able to untangle himself from the animal and rise to his feet. Once again Freddy raced off, turned, and prepared for another assault until Wolff held out his finger and gave a stern command. “No, Freddy. No.”
The animal’s countenance sagged as he slowed to a stop. Then, raising his tail over his head, he loped toward Wolff in his favorite goofball fashion.
“I’m sorry, boy, but I really have to go.”
Freddy leaned hard against Wolff as the man reached down to give him one last series of pats. “Tonight, before I go home. I promise.”
As Wolff turned and headed toward the door, Freddy stayed glued to his side, then raised his arm for the mandatory last hug. Wolff stooped down and held the animal for a moment. “See you in a few,” he said. Freddy chortled and seemed almost to sigh as Wolff withdrew and headed out the door.
Wolff’s specialty was mice. Transgenetic mice. Once the specific DNA was recognized and isolated, it was his job to oversee the placement of that DNA into the eggs of the mice, creating and raising up each new generation of the animals.
The actual insertion of the DNA into the egg was fairly simple: Remove the egg from the mouse and stick that egg under a stereoscopic microscope. With the left hand, turn the micromanipulator knob that holds a tiny pipette — a microscopic glass rod that uses small amounts of suction to position the egg and hold it in place. Once the egg is in place, move the right micromanipulator knob and insert a hollow needle directly into the egg. Once the membrane of the egg has been penetrated, inject the DNA. It’s as simple as that. In fact, a good technician can insert DNA into one egg every twenty seconds.
Once the egg’s DNA has been altered, it is surgically reimplanted into the mouse, and just twenty days later, there is a new brand of mice that the world has never seen.
Of course, the obvious question is: Why not do this with human eggs? A good question, and one that provides a field day for dozens of sci-fi writers. But there are drawbacks. First, it is highly illegal. Second, to obtain the desired results, one would have to wait for the fetus to develop, be born, and in some cases grow to adulthood. For humans, that period is at the very minimum nine months, and depending on the characteristic being developed, possibly twenty years or more. For mice, twenty days. And with the competition and breakneck speed of genetic research, every day is like a year.
Wolff suited up in the paper gown and booties, headed down the hall, and entered the pressured room of his mice colonies. It had been nearly three weeks since the malicious slaughter of one of the mice. Quite a shock at the time. And, despite the tests, no one was entirely sure what had happened. Some abnormality, yes. A mutation in one of the mice, of course. But the jury was still out as to how and why.
Wolff reached for the Plexiglas clipboard and double-checked the day’s charts. It wasn’t until he strolled toward the back of the room that he noticed it. One of the upper Lucite cages had no movement inside. Colony 233. He reached for the container, slid it out, and gasped.
The cage was covered in blood. All six mice were dead.
CHAPTER 7
COLEMAN STOOD SILENTLY IN the snow, awed by the absolute stillness. He’d seen snow every year of his life, but not like this. Not with this tranquility, this soothing, calming peace. It had fallen steadily all night and had just let up now, a little before sunrise. He scanned the exercise yard. Every harsh edge, every sharp corner was smoothed and rounded by the soft whiteness. The administration building, the picnic tables, the fences with their rolls of razor wire, everything was covered in gentle serenity. The grime and dirt and mud were completely gone. Erased. Even the sounds from the distant highway were cleansed and absorbed by the smooth, chaste blanket. It was as if the snow had removed all evil from the world — softening its hardness, covering its filth, replacing its vulgarity with silent, pristine purity.
The intensity of Coleman’s emotions had been leveling off for the past several days. He still marveled at the beauty surrounding him and grieved over the painful loneliness he saw in individuals, but as the days came and went he was able to gain more and more control over his reactions to those feelings.
He took a deep breath of the cold, fresh air. He felt a tingling all the way to his fingers. He was alive. For the first time that he could remember, really alive. By comparison, his past had been a faded, black-and-white photograph. For thirty-five years he had been sleepwalking, barely aware of his surroundings. Now he was awake. Seeing and hearing and feeling everything as if for the very first time.
But with the exhilaration came the other feeling. His own loneliness. It never left. It was a gnawing hunger he could not shake, an ache that the beauty and wonder around him only heightened. It was as if that beauty were part of something greater and grander than he could ever be. It made him feel cut off, like a perpetual outsider — a fleeting shadow dancing over the surface of creation without ever really being able to connect with it. Though he never ceased to marvel at the world’s beauty, whether it was the reflection within a drop of water or the intricate designs in the palm of his hand, he knew that something much grander and deeper was calling to him. But calling him to what?
He took another breath. The air bit his nostrils and stung his throat. Today was the day. Actually, tomorrow at one minute after midnight. That’s when one of four electrical jolts would shoot through his body. That’s when Michael Coleman would finally die.
“Why can’t I just fake it?” he had asked.
“Fake electrocution?” Murkoski had scorned. “I don’t think so. We’ll g
reatly reduce the other three shocks, but the first will knock you unconscious and stop your heart, so you won’t have to worry about faking anything.”
“And if you don’t revive me in time?”
“We’ll revive you. The assistant coroner will actually be one of our people. He’ll roll you to the waiting ambulance and restart your heart in there. We have roughly six-and-a-half minutes. It will be close, but we can do it.”
Coleman had not been reassured.
“Relax,” Murkoski had grinned, “we’ve been practicing for days. You’re too valuable to us to watch you go up in smoke.”
Coleman didn’t grin back. “No more surprises?” he had asked, looking into Murkoski’s eyes, searching for the truth.
“No more surprises,” Murkoski had answered solemnly. “We’ll run you straight from the prison to Saint John’s, where one of the top plastic surgeons in the country will make alterations.”
“How much of my face will they change?”
“Enough that you won’t be recognized. Might even fix that nose you’re so proud of.”
Coleman lightly touched his nose. It had been broken two, maybe three times in fights, and had not always been set with the greatest of care. “How long will all this take?”
“You’ll be at the hospital a week to ten days. Then we fly you out to Washington State where you’re set up with a nice job and an apartment.”
They had discussed a thousand and one other details about the continuation of the experiment and what would be required of Coleman. But, in his usual insensitivity, Murkoski brought it down to the bottom line: “You’re our guinea pig. We’re giving you a second chance, and you owe us big. We won’t ask much. Come into the lab once or twice a week for tests. But we’re the boss, and whatever we say —”
“What if I get tired of it?” Coleman interrupted. “What if I decide to walk?”
Again Murkoski smiled, a smile Coleman was growing less and less fond of. “First of all, I doubt that a man of your integrity would double-cross us like that, and second …” Murkoski seemed to hesitate, unsure whether to continue.
Coleman pressed him. “And second?”
“And second, I’ve included a little chemical leash to insure that we’ll always stay in touch.”
“Leash?”
“Have you ever had the flu, Mr. Coleman?”
“Of course.”
“Remember all those aches and pains? Well, those aches and pains don’t really come from the flu virus. They come from your own immune system, from chemicals that your body releases called cytokines.”
“What’s that got to do —”
“During the bone-marrow transplant I took the liberty of altering your DNA in another area.”
Coleman felt his anger rising. “You did what?”
“It was the only way to insure that you wouldn’t, as you say, ‘walk.’ ”
With effort, Coleman held his anger in check. “What did you do?”
“Actually, it’s pretty basic. If you don’t come in every five to six days for an injection, your own body will release so many cytokines that it’ll make your worst flu experience seem like a picnic.”
That conversation had taken place four days ago. And, although Coleman’s anger had quickly subsided, his lack of trust for Murkoski had not. The youngster was ruthlessly ambitious.
Back in the yard, the sun was just rising. The bank of clouds resting on the horizon diffused it like a light behind fine china. Snow started falling again. Coleman tilted his head back and felt the cool flakes softly touch his face. Then Michael Coleman did something he had never done in his life. He closed his eyes, opened his mouth, and caught a snowflake on his tongue. It was incredible. Absolutely amazing. Joy spread through his chest, and he had to chuckle. If the boys back on the Row could only see him now.
“Cole?” The voice was quiet and considerate. “Coleman?”
Coleman lowered his head and opened his eyes. It was one of the guards standing in the open doorway to the administration building. “Hour’s up. Sorry.”
Coleman nodded. He turned and started crunching back through the snow toward the door. “Where to now?” he asked.
“Back to the hospital wing. That’s where they’ll keep you under observation until…well, until tonight.”
Coleman nodded again, appreciating the man’s sensitivity. He lifted up his face one last time and felt the cool flakes gently brush his cheeks. Then, lowering his head, he stepped back into the building for the very last time.
Sixteen hours later, Harold Steiner stuck his hands deep into his overcoat pockets to fight off the freezing night. It was 11:00 p.m., and despite the cold, he and three hundred other people stood in the prison parking lot, some of them in favor of capital punishment, others opposed. The two factions were separated by a simple snow fence and about a dozen state troopers, heavily armed and wearing riot gear. Michael Coleman had made quite an impression.
Steiner’s side was the loudest — and drunkest. Chants went up every few minutes, ending in applause or slowly dying out. Some spectators waved signs and placards with such incredibly witty sayings as “HEY, COLE, IT’S FRY-DAY” or “LIGHT UP THEM COLES FOR A BBQ.” The atmosphere outraged Steiner. Instead of an equitable and impartial execution of justice, these people were treating it like a sporting event.
The folks on the other side were no better. They cradled their candles and held their flashlights while praying and crying and singing. A mixed lot. Shallow thinkers, mostly. Religious do-gooders and knee-jerk emotionalists, more concerned about saving a diseased killer than preserving society. He knew that at least a dozen had been imported by Amnesty International, and probably that many more by the ACLU.
His side was just as diverse, including anti-crime groups, good ol’ boys looking for a good ol’ time, and women’s rights advocates. Yes, indeed. Capital punishment could make for some very strange bedfellows.
Steiner was disappointed that he was not being permitted to actually watch Coleman die. He blamed himself for that. After all, the man had played him like a fool. Coleman’s performance at their meeting had quickly leaked out, and the media had had a grand old time. “Incensed Victim Confronts Broken Murderer,” “Convicted Killer Has Change of Heart,” “Cole Begs Forgiveness.” The headlines and articles had all been variations on the same theme. Michael Coleman had finally seen the error of his ways, and now his victims, like Harold Steiner, were suddenly being cast as the guilty aggressors. The gall! Harold Steiner guilty? Of what? Of upholding the law? Of honoring the only thing holding civilization together? If that was the charge, fine. Consider him guilty. He could think of no higher honor than being accused of maintaining the majesty of the law.
Of course he’d heard all the arguments…
“What about mercy?” some demanded.
Mercy had its place. But no one seemed to remember Missy’s own screaming for mercy as she was stabbed to death in her apartment.
“People change,” opponents insisted. “The Michael Coleman you are executing today is not the same Michael Coleman who killed seven years ago.”
Maybe so. Then again, who knew what type of person Missy would be if she had been allowed to live.
“Public execution does not deter murder.”
A non-issue. For Steiner, capital punishment was more principle than practical. A line drawn in the sand that says you may go only so far in your attempts to unravel society, and no further.
Then there were the fringe arguments. The liberal Christians who insisted that the only time Jesus Christ commented on the death penalty was when he released the woman caught in adultery. Or the Jews, with their provisions in the Torah for forgiveness of the repentant. All valid arguments, he was sure. But it was one thing to live in the pristine world of theological theory, quite another to survive in an imperfect world that contained monsters who wanted to destroy it.
TV lights glared suddenly in the parking lot. Steiner craned his neck and caught a glimpse of someo
ne trying to raise a swastika. It was quickly torn down.
The media. It was because of the media that he was out here in the cold instead of inside where he belonged. He’d expected Coleman to pull some sort of theatrics at their meeting; he just hadn’t expected anything so extensive. Unfortunately, Coleman’s dramatics had thrown Steiner back on the front page of the World-Herald — and straight to the bottom of the waiting list of those wanting to see Coleman die.
That was the bad news. The good news was that, no matter what spin the press put on it, or on him, the people of Nebraska were no different from the rest of the seventy-five percent of the nation who endorsed the death penalty. Since its reinstatement by the Supreme Court in 1976, nearly three hundred people had been executed — and that figure was rising quickly. By some estimates, the U.S. would soon be executing one hundred convicted killers a year. Not a lot when, last year alone, twenty-two thousand Americans were murdered (nearly thirteen times the death rate of England). But, again, it was a line in the sand. Some justice was better than no justice.
There was another stir in the crowd. “Look, it’s Cole!”
“Isn’t that Coleman? Right up there?”
Steiner looked toward the administration building, a hundred yards away. The second-story window to the far right had been lit all night. Rumor had it that this was hospital room 7, Coleman’s holding room for the last twenty-four hours. And now, just on the other side of the horizontally barred window, there was the silhouette of a man — the outline of his head round and clean, as if it had been shaved.
Jeers and chants immediately rose from Steiner’s side of the parking lot.
Waving candles and prayers from the other.
Steiner glanced at his watch. In fifty minutes, the circus would be over. Unless the three-person Board of Pardons granted last-minute clemency, the craziness of this evening, not to mention Steiner’s seven-and-a-half years of suffering, would finally come to an end.
The process had been long and arduous. Nebraska law provides that any death sentence be automatically reviewed by the state supreme court. From there, Coleman had gone to the U.S. Supreme Court — but the justices had had the good sense to refuse to hear him, and the case had been returned to the original court for review. When that appeal failed, Coleman’s lawyers once again brought him to the state supreme court, then the U.S. district court, and finally to the Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis. From there, they had again appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
