Analog SFF, April 2012

by Dell Magazine Authors

  Sissy put a magnified scan of the circulatory system that had just been built up on the screen. “See where red turns black?”

  “I see it.”

  “Red is normal blood flow. Black is zero blood flow. This is one of the really great things about the residue of nanostructures that temporarily remain in the reconstructed arteries and veins. They can act like valves. I can do this"—She stroked and tapped the table-side display—"and now blood starts slowly working its way into the new pipes and tissues. Check it out.”

  She bumped up the magnification of the area where reconstruction had begun. “Now you can see individual capillaries coming online. Used to be when you connected two blood vessels you had to worry about leaks. Not an issue when new tissue literally grows out of the old at a cellular level.”

  There on the table, pink suffused the new leg as it continued to take shape and become alive.

  * * * *

  The procedure was complete. Blood flow at one hundred percent, the skin pink, healthy, and reactive. Tests that stimulated nerve routing had been run, proving that every muscle was connected and ready to kick butt.

  “You've done an absolutely terrific job here,” Colonel Webb said. “Congratulations.”

  “Thanks.” Sissy glanced at the clock. The procedure had taken just over three hours. Her first thought was, Where did the time go? Then she realized what she'd accomplished in just three short hours.

  “Mind if I take a closer look?”

  “No, not at all.”

  Webb came around the table to stand beside her. After studying the new leg a moment he glanced her way. “Do you mind if I compare it to the other leg? So I can see the exact imaging?”

  “You really should. You'll find that even the placement of leg hair is duplicated.”

  “That's really something.” The Colonel appeared to know what he was doing as he reached for the wand used to create an opening in the nanospun sterile fabric covering the other leg. The cloth parted easily under its blunt tip. Once he'd made the cut he wanted, he put the wand aside.

  He pulled the drape apart.

  “Perfect match,” he said.

  “Of course,” Sissy agreed.

  “Except for this,” he said with a chuckle.

  Sissy bent to look where he was pointing.

  It was a tattoo. A picture of Dorothy and Toto from the Judy Garland version of The Wizard of Oz, posed before a rainbow arching down to touch the edge of the Emerald City. The image was surrounded by the phrase THERE'S NO PLACE LIKE HOME repeated three times and forming a circle.

  She shrugged. “It was edited out.”

  “Editing it out was a good idea,” Colonel Webb said with a satisfied nod. He rearranged the drape to cover the original leg once more, straightened up. “You're doing an excellent job here. Like I said the other night, you're meeting or surpassing all our expectations.”

  Sissy ducked her head shyly at the praise. “Thank you, sir.”

  “You're welcome.” He checked his watch. “You're due for a short break, and you've sure as hell earned one. So I'll get out of your hair so you can take ten, then get back to it. I'm sure you have new patients waiting.”

  “Always new patients,” she agreed.

  “Yes, there are,” Webb said, looking pleased with her attitude, her understanding of the situation, and how well the experiment was going overall.

  Copyright (C) 2012 Stephen L. Burns

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  * * *

  Serial: TRIGGERS: PART III OF IV

  by Robert J. Sawyer

  When the rules change radically, power may no longer be where you'd expect. . . .

  The story so far:

  An al-Qaeda splinter group named al-Sajada has been attacking US monuments with new, highly portable explosives. On a cold November morning, President Seth Jerrison attempts to reassure his distraught nation by giving a speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC, but a would-be assassin's bullet tears into his back. He's rushed to Luther Terry Memorial Hospital, accompanied by Secret Service agent-in-charge Susan Dawson. There, surgeon Eric Redekop and his team labor to save the president.

  In the same hospital, memory researcher Ranjip Singh is using experimental equipment to try to erase the painful memories of a young Iraq War veteran named Kadeem Adams, who is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.

  An al-Sajada bomb is discovered on the roof of the White House. Everyone is evacuated, but the bomb goes off. As it does, a power surge goes through Singh's memory-erasing equipment.

  Meanwhile, the surgical team is losing President Jerrison. His heart stops, and Jerrison—a closet atheist—undergoes a classic near-death experience, including a life review. But, as he tells hospital CEO Mark Griffin when he's revived, it's not his own life that he saw.

  It soon becomes apparent that twenty or so people at the hospital have had their memories linked in a circular chain: person A reads the memories of B, B reads the memories of C, and so on. Susan Dawson can read the memories of Ranjip Singh, and Susan herself is read by Kadeem Adams. Dr. Redekop is reading a much-younger nurse named Jan Falconi and he, in turn, is read by real-estate agent Nikki Van Hausen. President Jerrison can read Kadeem Adams (it was the young vet's life he saw flash by), and someone, as yet unidentified, is reading President Jerrison. Recognizing that this represents an enormous threat to national security, Agent Dawson orders the hospital locked down, and begins a systematic search for whoever is accessing the president's memories.

  Unbeknownst to Dawson, the United States is about to embark on a massive clandestine military operation code-named Counterpunch, aimed at the terrorists who have been attacking the US. Secretary of Defense Peter Muilenburg is supervising preparations from the Pentagon.

  The man who shot Jerrison is killed trying to escape, and is soon identified. Shockingly, it was Gordon “Gordo” Danbury, a Secret Service agent. The attempt on the president's life was an inside job—and it's anyone's guess how high up the conspiracy goes.

  It seems everyone within a 32-foot-radius of Singh's equipment was affected. Hospital worker Rachel Cohen turns out to be able to read the memories of lawyer Orrin Gillett, and the two of them, previously unacquainted, quickly become a couple. Dora Hennessey has come to the hospital from London to donate a kidney to her long-estranged father, Josh Latimer; Dora's memories are read by hospital security guard Ivan Tarasov.

  Meanwhile, Eric Redekop is recalling more of nurse Jan Falconi's past—including the fact that she's abused by her husband Tony, and that she is addicted to narcotics.

  Cardiac specialist David January claims to be linked to his wife Ann—but is really linked to the hospital CEO, Mark Griffin, and intends to use the knowledge he has of Griffin's past to blackmail him. A fight ensues between the two of them, which Ranjip Singh breaks up, to his and everyone else's surprise, by expert use of karate—Singh didn't know karate before this, but the person whose memory he can read does. The linkages are getting more powerful as time goes by.

  President Jerrison is frustrated being stuck in the hospital on the eve of Operation Counterpunch. Killing time, he thinks back to the “13 Code,” a substitution-cipher system he invented when he was ten years old.

  Jerrison realizes he's heard the name of his assailant before. In fact, the day before he was shot, as he was entering the Oval Office, he overheard Leon Hexley, the director of the Secret Service, saying into his cell phone, “Tell Gordo to . . ."—but Jerrison can't recall the rest of it.

  It turns out that an 87-year-old white woman named Bessie Stilwell was likely affected by Singh's equipment, but she left the hospital before the lockdown began. Her vision and hearing are poor, and although her memories are being read by an African-American member of the Secret Service named Darryl Hudkins, he can't figure out where she's gone.

  A missing link is discovered in the memory chain—one of the affected people is four months pregnant, and her baby is part of the circle. That l
ets Singh determine that Bessie Stilwell, who remains missing is likely the person reading the president's memories. At last, Darryl Hudkins recognizes where she is—the Watergate Hotel, near the hospital. He rushes off to bring her back, but is appalled by her racist memories. Still, she's definitely the one reading Jerrison. Lawyer Orrin Gillett has pointed out that legally Susan Dawson can't detain people any longer, and the other affected individuals leave Luther Terry as the lockdown ends.

  President Jerrison has a private meeting in his hospital room with Bessie Stilwell, to see if the old woman can remember any more of the enigmatic phone conversation he overheard in the Oval Office. Probing his memories, she adds one more ominous word to what Director Hexley had said: “Tell Gordo to aim . . .”

  Jerrison asks Singh if there's any way to bring back more of the memory. Singh says memories come back best at the place in which they were lain down—but, since the White House has been destroyed, there's no possibility of that anymore.

  Security guard Ivan Tarasov heads home, but seeing his own three-year-old daughter triggers him to recall Dora Hennessey's memories from when she was the same age—horrid memories of being sexually abused. His autistic brain lets him remember things Dora herself cannot.

  Meanwhile, Susan Dawson accedes to Private Kadeem Adams's request that he get to meet the president—who is reading his memories. It seems a perfect photo op, and all is going well, until Adams deliberately triggers them both to have a traumatic flashback to the Iraq war, making Jerrison the first president in decades to feel a soldier's terror at the things those back home had ordered soldiers to do.

  * * * *

  Chapter 27

  Susan Dawson spoke into her sleeve mike. “Get Singh in here right away!” She wheeled on Kadeem Adams. “What did you do to him?”

  “Nothing,” said Adams, but he seemed to be struggling to get even that single word out.

  Susan looked over at the president, lying on his bed, his head propped up, his eyes wide with terror, sweat beading on his forehead. Dr. Alyssa Snow was listening to his chest with a stethoscope.

  “Nothing my ass!” said Susan. “What did you do to him?”

  But Kadeem's eyes were closed and he was swaying erratically from side to side, as if having trouble keeping his balance. He hadn't touched him. He hadn't done anything, and yet—

  “For God's sake, Kadeem,” Susan exclaimed, “he's recovering from heart surgery!”

  She heard rapid footfalls in the corridor outside, and then the door burst open revealing Ranjip Singh in the company of one of the Secret Service agents. Susan pointed at Jerrison. “Kadeem did something to the president's mind and now he's having a seizure.”

  Susan watched Ranjip turn to look at Kadeem, and she followed his gaze. Kadeem had his eyes scrunched tightly shut and was shaking his head rapidly in a small arc from left to right. His forehead was slick with sweat.

  “Oh, shit,” said Singh, the first time Susan had heard him swear. He went over to Kadeem and guided him—Kadeem's eyes were still closed—to the chair next to the president's bed, and gently, almost lovingly, he eased Kadeem into it. And then he took one of Kadeem's hands in his, light brown against dark brown, and, to Susan's surprise, he reached over and took one of the president's in his other hand, beige against light brown, and he stood between the two men, a human bridge, and he said, “All right, both of you, listen to me—listen to me! You're having a flashback. It's me, it's Ranjip Singh, and you're at Luther Terry Hospital. You're home, you're in the United States, and you're safe. You're safe!”

  Susan started toward the bed; she didn't like that Singh had brought Kadeem so close to Jerrison. But Dr. Snow motioned for her to stay back. Susan could see the sheet over the president's chest heaving up and down. Above the rapid beeping of his heart-rate monitor, she could hear Kadeem whimpering softly.

  “You're safe,” Ranjip said again. “You're safe. That was thousands of kilometers away and many, many months ago. It's over. Kadeem, it's over. And Mr. President—Mr. Jerrison—Seth—it's over.”

  Susan felt helpless—and furious; she never should have allowed Adams in here. Christ, he might end up as the guy who'd managed to succeed at what Gordo Danbury had failed to do. The president's heart was still racing, and Dr. Snow was busily preparing a hypodermic.

  “Take a deep breath,” Ranjip said, looking at the president, whose eyes were still wide, and “Take a deep breath,” he said to Kadeem, whose grip, Susan saw, was so tight now on Singh's hand that it must be hurting them both. “Hold it in,” Ranjip said. “Just hold it, for a count of five: one, two, three, four, five. Now, let it out, slowly, slowly—that's right, Seth, that's right. Kadeem, you can do it, too: slowly, gently, let the air out, let the memory out, release it, let it go . . .”

  * * * *

  There was an extended silence from the president's monitor as his heart skipped a beat, and when that happened, Susan's own followed suit. Dr. Snow looked at him with concern, but when the beeps started again, they were progressively further apart.

  “Again,” said Ranjip. “Take a deep breath again, both of you. Relax. Now, concentrate on something peaceful: a clear blue sky. That's it; that's all—just that. The sky, blue and clean and bright; a beautiful summer's day, not a cloud to be seen. Peaceful, calming, relaxing.”

  It looked to Susan as though Kadeem's grip was lessening a bit, and he'd stopped making sounds. The president's eyes were no longer wide and he was blinking rapidly—perhaps as he imagined looking up at a sunny sky.

  Jerrison turned at last to Singh and seemed to recognize him. “Thank you,” he said softly. “Thank you.”

  Singh nodded and let go of the president's hand. He looked at Kadeem, and Dr. Snow immediately moved in and mopped the president's brow. She then placed her stethoscope back on the president's chest and nodded, apparently satisfied with what she was hearing.

  Kadeem was shaking, Susan saw, as if he were freezing to death. Ranjip was now facing him directly. He took both his hands and looked straight into Kadeem's eyes, which had finally opened. “It's all right,” Ranjip said again. “It's all right.”

  Ranjip had a puzzled expression. Susan realized the Canadian wanted to ask Kadeem what had triggered the flashback, but, of course, he couldn't; asking him that would bring the trigger to mind and might set off another episode. “He did it,” Susan said, pointing at Kadeem. “Deliberately.”

  “No,” said Ranjip, shaking his head. “Surely not.”

  “He did it,” Susan repeated. “He did that to the president.”

  Ranjip looked at Kadeem, as if expecting a denial, but when none was forthcoming, Ranjip said softly, his tone conveying he was stunned by what the young man had done. “Kadeem . . .”

  Susan spoke into her sleeve. “Dawson to Hudkins and Michaelis: come to Prospector's room right away.” She looked at Kadeem. “You've made the mistake of your life,” she said. “This was the stupidest thing you—”

  “Agent Dawson.” The voice was weak but oh-so-familiar.

  She turned to face Prospector. “Yes, Mr. President?”

  “Go . . . easy . . . on the . . . young man,” Jerrison said.

  “But, sir, he—”

  Jerrison silenced her with a hand gesture and he turned his gaze to Kadeem just as the door opened, revealing the two agents Susan had called for. “Private Adams,” Jerrison said, still weak, “was that . . . what it was . . . really like?”

  Kadeem nodded once. “Yes, sir, Mr. President. I'm sorry I had to—”

  Susan saw the president make the same silencing gesture at Kadeem as he had at her, and Seth Jerrison was a hard man to disobey. “You went through all of that?”

  “Yes, sir, Mr. President.” Kadeem paused, then: “And not just me, sir. Lots of us went through it, or something similar.”

  Jerrison seemed to consider this for a time, then, at last, he slowly nodded, and, to Susan's surprise, he said, “Thank you, Private Adams. Thank you . . . for sharing that with me.”
<
br />   And then Kadeem Adams surprised Susan. He stood up ramrod straight and crisply saluted his commander in chief. “Thank you, sir.”

  * * * *

  Eric Redekop and Janis Falconi exited the building, Eric carefully avoiding the reporters who were camped out front. It was a cold night, and he found himself feeling an urge to put his arm around Jan's shoulder, but he didn't. They walked along Pennsylvania Avenue. Things were eerily silent for a Friday night; doubtless, after today's bomb blast, many people were staying indoors. Eric remembered it had been the same way after 9/11, when an American Airlines 757 had crashed into the Pentagon.

  In the first block west of LT, they had a choice between the Foggy Bottom Pub and Capitol Grounds Coffee; thank God the pubs and cafés were keeping their doors open. They opted for the pub and found a booth near the back where they could talk.

  “So,” Eric said, after they'd sat down, and “So,” said Janis.

  A middle-aged waitress looking worn down by the day's events took their orders: two draft beers.

  “I don't know how long these linkages will last,” Eric said, “but . . .”

  “Yeah,” said Jan. “But.”

  “I . . . ah, I didn't know . . . I don't mean to pry. Really, I've been trying not to, but . . .”

  “But you can't help it. I know; I keep getting Josh Latimer's memories, too.”

  “At work, sometimes . . . when you're alone, you . . . to . . . to ease the pain, you . . .”

  She lowered her eyes. “Are you going to report me?”

  “No, no. I'd like to see you get help, though. You know there are confidential programs . . .”

  “Thanks.” She paused. “There's a lot of bad stuff in my life.”

  They were seated on opposite sides of the booth; her hands were on the table between them. He found his hand moving over to cover one of hers. “I know.”

  Their beers arrived.