by M. V. Kallai
The embryos did survive the night with Dana’s constant attention. She had not slept at all and this new day would be vital to the continuation of Lee’s madness. They had not spoken to each other since he stormed out yesterday. He had also worked through the night, in the locked Lab E with the stolen contents of Camden’s case. Dana had given some thought to how she would approach him today. She felt really strange inside when she thought about his plan, but the more she thought, the more her curiosity prevailed. Her mind was made up, she would commit completely to helping him succeed.
When Dana heard the lab door open, she put down the tube she was observing and rushed back to offer him some tea. Her knee was almost healed now and she could limp at a moderate pace.
“Lee! Lee…” she called, “How was your night? I was just going to make some tea for you.”
“You were?” Lee asked with genuine surprise. He looked tired. His hair was sticking out in all directions and his glasses were sideways on his face. His wrinkled shirt was half un-tucked and one of his shoes was untied.
“You look like you could use a rest, Lee, before our big day starts.”
“Yes. I think so,” he said and followed her to the kitchen. He sat while Dana prepared some tea. She was glad he wasn’t resisting being with her.
“You look awful,” Lee said out of the blue.
“What?” Dana couldn’t believe he noticed her looks. “Well, I’ve been up all night monitoring the emb…the er…project.” As of last night, Dana had stopped referring to them as anything synonymous with babies.
“You did?”
“Why wouldn’t you assume that? And if you thought I might not, why weren’t you there to do it?” Dana asked.
“In case you were right about your reaction. I believe Camden would stop me from proceeding any further. The fact that you didn’t is remarkable.”
“So you were willing to risk the whole thing over my decision?”
“There was no real risk. They would have made it through the night with or without you. I know that from experience. Today is the day that matters. If you plan to continue to assist me, get some rest and meet me in one hour. There is a lot to do and I need you to be awake.”
Lee took his tea and went to his office for a nap.
Dana was deeply confused. Had Lee just tested her? If so, she had obviously passed. Satisfied with this notion, Dana dragged her tired body to the bathroom and caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. She did look awful. Half her hair was in a frizzy wad on top of her head and her eye make-up had run down her face, making her look like the walking dead. Exhausted, Dana laughed at the irony of the image. She splashed some cold water on her face and went to lie down on Camden’s couch, which she had now officially claimed as her bed.
Five hours later, panic filled Tripple Laboratories.
“The environment is not strong enough, Lee! They need a proper womb.”
“Dammit, Dana! I can see that,” Lee said and scratched his head.
They were quiet for twelve straight minutes, just staring at each other. Their crucial day was not going well. The embryos were not dying, but they were weakening rapidly.
“I have an idea,” Lee said finally. “Keep them alive.”
“How?”
“Do whatever you have to do. Make your noises or something,” Lee said.
With that, Lee bustled out, back to Lab E.
“For how long?” Dana yelled after him.” Getting no answer from Lee, she threw her hands up in the air and huffed and puffed around the lab. She stared at the little creatures struggling to survive. She hated them.
A couple hours later, she heard the door to the lab open and in walked Bearden. She smiled when she saw him and he beamed. His reaction reminded Dana that she hated him, too and her smile turned directly into a scowl.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“Lee called me, said it was urgent. Whatcha got in those tubes?”
“None of your business, Sergeant,” she said and moved her body to the front of the table to block as much as she could from view. Bearden laughed.
“I’m sure I’ll know soon enough. I told you, Lee trusts me…maybe more than you.”
“I doubt that,” she said. “He’s in the back, Lab E. You’ll have to knock, I’m sure it’s locked.”
Bearden lifted his eyebrows and winked at her when he walked away. Dana rolled her eyes, not being able to help the coy smile that appeared at the corner of her mouth. She turned her focus back to the embryos. They were still alive, but just barely. She adjusted the temperature of their tubes and dimmed the light over their table. Then, she moved to another section of the lab where she had begun experimenting with a number of materials, from organic to artificial, to develop a more suitable environment for the little things.
When Bearden came back out to the main lab there was a slightly disturbed look on his face. Since this was typically how he looked after meeting privately with Lee, it did not alarm Dana.
“Hey,” he said. “Are those the genetically altered babies?” He pointed to the tubes in the dark corner of the lab.
“Lee told you,” she answered.
“Yes. And if they are stable, he wants to tell you something, too.”
Dana’s eyes lit up with fervor as she responded,
“They’re stable. Let’s go.” She felt a flutter in her stomach knowing that Lee was finally going to share with her what he had been working with back there. The mystery item from Camden’s case that Bearden knew about and she didn’t. Truth was, she was a little glad that Bearden knew about her project. It took a weight off of her somehow. Even if the embryos did not survive, this was still a groundbreaking day for Tripple Laboratories; a three person collaborative was being born.
Back at the TRU Building, Mace Magner was running out of space to keep the activated bio-machines where they could remain confined and separate from one another. He resorted to clearing out supply closets and having stone cubicles built around the edges of the sub basement. Everyone in the weaponry unit was helping to implement the new safety training procedures. And everyone was on his or her guard as word about the dead soldier had spread throughout the unit. There was a definite tension in the air and it had carried over to the other side of the atrium. Scientists working with biomer bonding and the catalyst, who had never set foot in the weaponry department, felt strained. The once bubbly conversation, that was typical for the atrium, had turned into worried whispers. When two or more soldiers came through the doors from the weaponry side, the place fell quiet from scientists trying to hear pieces of their conversations. It was obvious from their faces and the extra long hours the soldiers were working, that something was wrong. A few scientists who had been working with the biomer for years, developed some theories about what could be happening, but not one of them imagined the scope of the weapons on the other side of the wall or that the biomer had developed a sort of awareness. All of the scientists, however, had recognized that their democratically elected team leader and catalyst discoverer, Sergeant Bearden Leitner, was spending less and less time in the lab and had suddenly gained access to the weapons side of the building. On three separate occasions, different scientists, who felt close to Bearden, had approached the subject with him, but Bearden was completely unwilling to share anything with them, outside of the work in the atrium. Naturally, his silence and separateness from the team put his co-workers on their guard when he was there. Bearden tried to act normal in spite of his new clearance, but he hated the cold shoulders and the whispers. No one was inviting him out for beers after work anymore, and he sat alone at lunch. And since he had no real family to speak of, his mother died ten years ago and he never knew his father, he felt isolated from everything that brought him happiness.
Chapter Forty
Not Again
The next morning, Bearden walked through the science atrium without greeting anyone and passed directly through the doors to the weaponry unit. He was looking for Mace M
agner. He needed to inform him that Lee Tripple was, in fact, in possession of the missing biomer and was no closer to finding a way to control the biomachines than the government was. This would not be a surprise for the major, as he knew in his gut where the biomer was. It would be bad news though, because he was running out of space to put the beasts and production was not stopping. His only choice would be to postpone activation of the second phase of biomachines, a slightly upgraded unit with a more graceful shape and enhanced agility. Since the first activation, with Gene and Dawn, Mace was actually sort of counting on Ganesh, Riles, and Tripple’s crime to bail his program out of the hole in which it was sinking. With his mole, Bearden, in place, he really had Tripple Laboratories working for him.
After ten minutes of searching the weaponry unit that had become a maze of newly constructed stone walls, Bearden found the major by following the sounds of his booming voice. He was in the middle of berating a group of tired looking soldiers for their shoddy work on installing the restraints in the newest section of building blocks. His face was the color of an almost ripe tomato and Bearden decided not to interrupt. He stood aside and watched the soldier’s faces droop more and more with shame. This was not the mood he’d hoped to find Major Magner in today.
When Mace was finished with his rant, he sent the soldiers off to restart their work and took notice of Bearden standing there.
“Sergeant, I hope you have some good news for me,” he said.
“I think that will depend on your perspective, sir,” Bearden replied.
Mace started walking deeper into the maze and Bearden followed. When they were out of earshot from where the rest of the unit was working, they ducked into a small stone room with one of the biomachines. There was barely room for the three of them to stand without touching each other. Bearden swallowed hard as he was forced to stare into the eyeless face of this monster. It stood there chained, practically inanimate and seemingly harmless. He tried to ignore the thing, but its small movements gave him the creeps. Mace smacked him in the back of the head.
“Snap out of it, Leitner. You look like you’ve seen a ghost!”
“I just haven’t been this close to one before.”
“Bull shit! This is partly your creation. You should feel proud to be standing here with…” Mace looked around the back of the machine for the designation. “…Betty.” The machine seemed to respond to its name being said and tugged at its restraints.
“I think she likes you,” Mace said.
“I don’t think that’s funny, sir,” Bearden replied.
“So what’s the news on Tripple?”
“You were right. The stolen biomer is in his lab…in a locked room.”
“Of course I was right! I hope you have something more to tell me than useless information that I already know.”
“It’s not much, but he is looking for a weakness. He’s breaking down the DNA and running gene interference piece by piece.”
“How long will that take? And leave out the scientific crap and give me the short answer.”
“I don’t know, sir. He’s got a very sophisticated system that I think if we tried here, could take months, even years. But he seems to have a way of identifying exactly what he is looking for. It’s really quite amazing.”
“I’m sure it is,” Mace grumbled.
“The problem is that he doesn’t know exactly what he is looking for,” Bearden added.
“But you can help him with that, right?”
“I would never be so bold to think I could help Dr. Tripple with something he couldn’t…”
Mace cut him off.
“Dammit, Leitner, I need you to crawl out of Tripple’s ass for the rest of this conversation. Do you understand me?” Mace yelled.
“Yes, sir. I will help him as best as I can.”
“You do that, and let me know the second you have something tangible that I can use. General Pike will not postpone this war forever.”
Bearden saluted, bumping Betty in the chin with his elbow, and made his way back out of the maze to the atrium for another uncomfortable day of being stared at and whispered about.
Maeve Daire was crouched in the venting system above an empty office next to Ganesh’s office. She was dressed in black from head to toe and her long shiny hair was completely hidden under her hat. She held a recording device with a voice amplifier against the wall closest to Ganesh. She was on her own mission, to find out if she could trust him with her traitorous secret. So far, he and Special Unit spy, Quinn, had said nothing of consequence. The two got along really well and Ganesh seemed to genuinely like him. It made her sad because there was no way Ganesh would come out of the assignment without being hurt, or killed. Maeve had yet to determine if Quinn’s was a kill mission, but she had been close by since she met Ganesh at his home. She had hoped he would have called for her help by now, but he had not. Maeve knew Ganesh was stubborn and wouldn’t readily admit if he was in over his head, so she just waited; ready to assist him if he needed her.
At 10:55, Quinn was in the middle of telling Ganesh a hilarious story about his first day of training involving some oversized pants and a stray rodent, when there was a knock on the office door. Ganesh who was laughing so hard there were tears in his eyes, cleared his throat to help stifle himself. Quinn opened the door and smiled at Sergeant Leitner.
“Hey, Bearden,” he said, “Come on in.”
“Hi Quinn,” Bearden said with a straight face and walked past him and stood in front of Ganesh’s desk, saluting the Colonel.
“Sergeant Leitner. Always a pleasure,” Ganesh said, still with a chuckle in his voice. In the vent, Maeve wrote down the name.
“I have something for you, sir,” Bearden said glancing sideways at Quinn to suggest that he should be dismissed.
“It’s ok, Leitner, what have you got?” Ganesh said holding out his hand.
Bearden gave him a sealed letter from Lee, which he promptly opened and read. Ganesh took a long deep breath.
“Anything I can help with?” Quinn asked.
“No, no. Just something from Lee Tripple inquiring about his friend, Professor Riles,” Ganesh lied.
“What’s it like working for that crazy man?” Quinn asked Bearden.
“Well, I’m only there a few hours a week, but it’s always interesting.”
“I heard that he eats the lab mice when he’s done testing them,” Quinn said.
“I seriously doubt that,” Bearden said with a laugh. “In fact I haven’t even seen any mice.”
“Yep! Because he eats them.”
“Boys! Enough,” Ganesh scolded them. “Leitner, come see me this afternoon, after 5:00. I will have seen Camden by then. I’m sure he will want to write a nice letter to his friend.”
“Yes, sir,” Bearden said. “Later, Quinn.”
“So, Leitner is a messenger boy for the science gods,” Quinn said when Bearden was gone.
“No, but Lee sends a friendly hello now and then and knows that Camden is not taking phone calls during his stay here. It’s faster than sending mail, I guess,” Ganesh said. Quinn knew he was lying, yet still his reports to General Pike were vague at best. Because Ganesh used to train spies like him, Quinn knew that getting his true secrets out in the open would be tricky. It was easy to speculate, but there was no hard evidence of thievery or government betrayal by Ganesh or his cohort Camden Riles.
Maeve, still listening in from above, however, was hoping for some government betrayal from her father figure. She had snaked a long scope through the vents just over Ganesh’s desk when Sergeant Leitner handed Ganesh that letter. She snapped a picture of the words on the paper that she would magnify and read later. She inched her way out of the vent and checked her stolen copy of the building plans to look for her best options of catching the conversation that Ganesh would have with Camden Riles later. Perhaps she would be lucky enough to get a glimpse of Camden’s reply to his friend, Lee. Either way, the fact that Ganesh was facilitating communica
tion between the two gave her hope that he was on her side of the fight. She would have to keep a close eye on Ganesh and Quinn today, but a little later. Maeve decided for the rest of the morning, she would follow Sergeant Bearden Leitner, in case he was more than a messenger. She worked her way out of the venting system and ducked into a restroom. She opened her small bag, checked her schematic of the building, changed her clothes and put on a wig.
Chapter Forty-One
Space
General Pike was also having a meeting in his office this morning, with Colonels Talper and Cline, and Major Magner. They were discussing the progress of the biomachines.
“The Phase Two units will have upgrades in their response systems. It is unlikely that they will be able to ignore their programming even if they decide to bond with each other,” Cline said.
“But, it is still a risk,” Talper added, “Bottom line, this biomer is unpredictable and we need to be prepared.”
“I agree,” said General Pike, “Which is why I have re-designated the open field behind the TRU Building for a new housing facility to house the activated phase two biomachines.
“Will we be able to stay on schedule for activations?” Mace asked.
“As long as you have made enough restraint lockers in the sub-basement for the rest of the Phase One units, Major.”
“We are almost at capacity down there, sir, but I can re-assign office space if necessary,” Mace replied.
“I would advise not to disturb the programmers space,” Talper said. “We need them on standby at all times during this process. Don’t you agree, General?”
“I do,” he said. “Find another way, Magner.”
“Yes, sir,” Mace said.
