by Nick Thacker
“Like water pressure,” Julie said.
“Exactly. Have just enough pressure up here from the thousands of tons of water, and all they’d need to do is redirect that drainage tunnel — the water from it, anyway — up here for a minute or two, and it would push the whole thing over. The scales would tip, and the door would open, releasing the rest of the water.
“It would flood their homes, but it would reveal their Hall of Records.”
“And if they didn’t survive for whatever reason, their Hall of Records would still be here, literally written in stone.”
Reggie nodded.
“That’s all great and stuff,” Ben said. “But how the hell do we get out of here?”
“That’s the best part,” Reggie said, pointing. Julie followed his finger and saw that one of the rectangular ventilation shafts had what looked like a ladder etched into the wall beneath it. “I think all that water would have no trouble opening a second door — one that allows people into the Hall of Records.”
“Or, in our case,” Mrs. E said, joining them. “Letting us out.”
The Mendel Paradox
1
Prologue
One Week Ago
Grindelwald, Switzerland
The wind whipped up and caused Alina to pull her scarf higher, covering the lower portion of her face. It was cold, colder here than she’d imagined it would be. It had been years since she’d been back, years since she had left for university in faraway Geneva.
While her parents and grandparents still lived in the small mountain town, Alina had worked hard to get out and “see the world.” That world had now expanded by only a bit over 100 miles, and she still had yet to leave her country of birth. Switzerland was beautiful, no doubt, but she wanted more.
She wanted to run along the white sand beaches of the Caribbean islands, to run with the bulls in Spain, and to run down the streets of bustling New York City.
She had chosen the career path that she believed would best allow her dreams and life to collide: international affairs. It was intriguing; she had always been interested in politics and the maneuvering of multinational corporations, and she was enjoying the myriad types of people she worked and studied with in Geneva.
Alina pulled her hat down next, finding that the scarf was barely holding back the oppressive cold. In this area of the country, winter hit hard and stayed long, and if it weren't for the necessity of spending most of their working lives outside, the inhabitants of Grindelwald would no doubt hibernate for the winter.
She picked up her pace, not an easy task during the uphill slog back to her parents' inn. Her family owned a large, multi-bedroom chalet that they used as a rental property for income. It had been in the family for generations. If Alina hadn't decided to run away and do something so brash as getting an education, she would have ended up running the inn and becoming a professional bed and breakfast owner.
They’d even named the place after her — Alina’s — when she was born.
Her family didn’t despise her choice of career, nor did they wish for her to fail. But she knew it had stung her father when she’d told them about her plans to attend the University of Geneva. He had expected his entire crop — three boys and a single girl — to follow in the family’s footsteps, to become innkeepers and local business owners. To keep the quaint, tourist-driven economy of Grindelwald alive.
She smiled to herself. It was a good dream, but it was an unrealistic one for children who had grown up with the latest video games, gadgets, and internet access. There was an entire world out there, one that she desperately wanted to see, and she was about to have the ability to do just that.
To her right, just off the small trail behind the first stand of pine trees, she heard a noise.
She stopped, cocked her head to the right.
The snow was deep, more than three feet already, and it dampened the sounds of the forest and nearby town. But it also quieted the air, stilled the early night, and allowed any fresh, close noises to be heard clearly.
She eyed the tree line. This was Gorber’s land, and she had played games and pranks in these woods with her brothers. She knew the area well, but at night the entire place had a different feel, a heavier feel. The light, airy openness of the Bernese Alps seemed to be replaced by a deep, intense seriousness when night fell upon the valley.
Perhaps it was because of the cold or the darkness caused by trees fighting for space for their own shadows. Or both.
The noise came again—a small, slight scratching sound.
It was coming from a space beyond a boulder, and it was directly toward the location she believed old Gorber's house sat. To get to the old plumber's house, another trail barely wide enough for a car to fit on it, wound around this stand of trees to the north, then doubled back down and ended up on the porch of his cabin.
But she couldn't be sure. It was dark and getting darker. Surely old Gorber wouldn't be out messing around in the woods at this hour.
She called into the woods. “Hello?”
She tried again in German.
No response came, and she turned back to the path after another moment. Her steps crunched through the compressed snow on the trail, and she was now acutely aware of her own noises.
Breath, hot and fast, a bit ragged.
Footsteps, slow and plodding, obvious and exact.
And the thousand quirks and strains in her clothing and jacket, rubbing and stretching as she moved.
About fifteen feet ahead, she heard the noise again. Her right ear picked it up first, and she flicked her head sideways but kept moving. This time the noise was louder.
Closer.
“H — Hello?”
The scratch came again, and then again, faster. The noise sounded like someone scraping pinecones against tree trunks, dragging them along the bark as they passed.
As they came closer to her.
Alina broke into a jog, then a run.
The sound turned from a gentle scraping to a pounding rhythm.
Or was that the sound of her own heart?
She ran faster, pushing and urging her legs to cooperate, to fight against the tight pants she’d thrown on at her parents’ house before leaving for the inn. Why had she decided to wear something with so little utility? Why hadn’t she just thrown on sweatpants or snow pants?
The pounding continued, directly behind her now, and she realized that it was now off-beat. Her own heart was making plenty of noise, but it was a triplet rhythm, whereas the scraping-pounding sound from behind her was more of a military march.
She felt her breath giving out, her body simply unable to continue at this pace. She had never been athletic, and she hadn’t spent nearly enough time in the university gym, only going when she believed that cute guy from her European History course was…
The pounding stopped. The scraping stopped. Her heart continued to beat.
She kept running, but she slowed. Why had it stopped?
She wanted to continue on; she could see the lights of the inn in the distance, just beyond the tops of the pines that lined the descending hill in front of her.
But she had to know.
She needed to know what it was that had made the noise.
It had stopped only a half-second before, but she had continued moving forward. She slowed now, stopping in the middle of the road.
Then, just as slowly, she turned.
She looked behind her, seeing what it was that had followed her out of the woods.
And she screamed.
2
Ben
Three Days Ago
Anchorage, Alaska
Ben held up the package of hand warmers, wondering if the people who had designed them had ever truly experienced cold. He sighed, then mumbled under his breath. “Five dollars for a pack of these things?”
He tossed the orange pack of hand warmers back into the bin on the shelf and moved on. He needed a few more supplies, mostly small items and refills for his
first-aid kit, to fill out his ‘bug-out bag,’ a precaution in case he had to leave the cabin quickly and a ready-to-go survival pack.
He liked to keep it full and prepared for anything, but he really enjoyed the process of shopping for the items he kept inside it. He was in Anchorage, at one of the big-box sports and outdoor stores, and he’d just been wandering through the single aisle of clearance items, hoping to find something useful that he didn’t have yet.
So far, it had been a bust.
He’d stocked up on first-aid gear and more gauze, finding his supply dwindling, especially after a surprise rescue mission had taken him on snowmobile up into the mountains behind his land. He’d had to rescue the pilot of a downed plane, treat his injuries, then help him retrieve data from the crash site.
His kit and gear had performed well, but he had left the mountains short on some critical supplies.
Harvey "Ben" Bennett, the leader of the newly formed Civilian Special Operations, was a bear of a man. Tall and thick, with brown hair and brown eyes, he looked like an enlarged version of an average American man. He kept the hair short enough not to have to worry about it, and he wore clothes that allowed him comfort and utility, which fit in well in the backwoods of Alaska.
The lingering winter was still pressing down on the area, so today he had on a wool base layer underneath a red and brown plaid long-sleeved shirt. A heavier coat rested on the passenger-side front seat of his SUV, but the early afternoon sun had warmed him enough that he’d gone into the store without it.
His phone buzzed in his pocket. He kept it on silent, and there were only three callers that he allowed through to actually vibrate the phone’s ringer. One was Julie, the caller now.
“Hey,” he said, bringing the phone up his ear.
“You still shopping?”
“About to head out. They didn’t really have anything here — I’ll just order online. What’s up?”
Julie paused, and Ben could hear her clicking around on her laptop. His wife was one of the CSO members, and she'd recently taken a role as a sort of intelligence and information technology officer. She had a degree in computer science and had worked for the CDC as a computer information systems researcher, where she had excelled before meeting Ben.
“New job,” she finally said. “Just came in, Mr. E vetted it. Looks legit to me.”
“What is it?” Ben asked, switching his phone to his other hand as he pushed his near-empty cart toward the checkout area.
“Apparently we’re being asked to meet with a woman, Eliza Earnhardt, who claims she has information on a company that’s doing some… how did she put it? ‘Questionable research.’”
“‘Questionable research,’ huh?” Ben said. “Sounds fun. What sort of questionable research?”
Ben could almost hear Julie shaking her head. “Didn’t say.”
“They never do. Must be legit — no one ever shows their cards on the first hand.”
“It would make them a poor poker player,” Julie said.
“Anyway, what’s the plan? Is there a meeting set up?”
“Mrs. E is working on it; I’ll have more for you when you get back.”
Mrs. E was another member of the CSO, the wife of the man who had brought them all together. She and her husband had run a massive communications conglomerate and had invested heavily in satellite communications and technology earlier in the decade. Now, with Mr. E's health issues and reclusiveness preventing him from participating in the day-to-day dealings of his company, they had turned their sights on more philanthropic efforts.
"Okay, well I'm checking out, then I'll be heading home. Give me an hour."
“You got it — I’ll send Reggie a text; I think he’s somewhere in the lower forty-eight.”
“Sounds good, Jules. Thanks.”
He hung up and pushed the cart toward the counter. The young blonde-haired girl behind the counter looked to be no older than fourteen, and she gave him a wide, braces-covered toothy smile as he neared the register. He’d seen her here before. Nice girl, probably working part-time on weekends and in the summer.
“Find everything okay?” she asked.
“Not really,” Ben said. “I think you guys are out of milk and cheese.”
The grin faded and was replaced by a mix of confusion and terror. “Uh, sir… this is a sports store. We sell outdoor products.”
Ben nodded slowly, looking up at the ceiling and really trying to sell the ruse. “Ah, that must be why. Okay, thanks.”
He held back a smile as she passed the two items he was purchasing over the conveyer belt, but she did a poor job of hiding her eye roll.
3
Lars
Three Days Ago
Grindelwald, Switzerland
Lars slammed the receiver down onto its cradle. It was a satisfying experience; pressing the ‘END’ button on a cellphone lacked the impactful tactile feedback of smashing a mechanical device into another one.
He’d had the old-school phone installed here for personal reasons. His team and the contractors who’d built his office in this brand-new building didn’t know what that reason was, and he had no interest in telling them. The office was his, and he’d put it together his way.
But that way — the way he’d set up the space — wasn’t just his way. It was his grandfather’s office, or at least an exact replica of it. Down to the type of now-ancient telephone he’d purchased from an antiques collector in Prague, everything matched his recollection of his grandfather’s study from when Lars was a boy.
His grandfather’s own office had morphed over the years into a more modern, more practical suite, from which he ran his EKG empire. Baden Tennyson, the ‘Baron of Biology,’ was a man exceptionally gifted in not just the pursuit of science but also in the art of building empires. Baden Tennyson had grown his company into a worldwide powerhouse of research and development in the biological sciences, and he had formed strong alliances with multinational pharmaceutical companies that paid him and his company attractive dividends.
Lars, the 'golden boy' of the family and longtime expected successor to his grandfather's throne, had spent his formative years as an Army doctor, then transitioned into medical research. Finally, he had been deemed by his grandfather old enough to lead an entire division of EKG. That age — thirty-four — was far later than Lars would have wanted, but he wasn't going to argue with his grandfather. It had taken a lifetime, but Lars finally had gotten the coveted position of Director and Lead Researcher at the brand-new division of his grandfather's company.
Lars had been involved with every aspect of the growth process of the new division, from selecting a proper secluded location to hiring each of the employees and security team members. Lars was a perfectionist, and he now had the blank check and blessing from his idol to build exactly what he wanted. This division was Lars’ pride and joy, and he fully intended to make it his grandfather’s as well.
Everything about this room needed to reflect his passion for his job and his desire to follow in his grandfather’s footsteps. He had no desktop computer in here — though he carried a laptop with him wherever he went — and most of the modernized equipment he needed for the more mundane aspects of his job he kept in his assistant’s office next door. He took notes on a yellow legal pad, using a replica of a 1959 fountain pen he’d once seen his grandfather use. He’d even had a doorbell-like intercom system put in, but it was rarely used.
Lars Tennyson stood and stretched. He needed a break, but now was not the time. There was work to be done, and that work was now reaching the point of no return. If they stopped the research, they couldn’t resume it later. It was all or nothing, now or never.
He strode through the office, admiring the way his shoes sunk into the soft, plush orange carpet — so unlike the shiny tiled floor throughout the rest of the building — and knocked on the door of his assistant’s office.
He didn’t wait for a response. Lars flung the door open to find his plump, round assi
stant, Roger Dietrich, panting and surprised, the cheap big-box store-purchased desk speaking volumes about the man sitting behind it. Efficient, practical, savvy.
“Lars — what’s up?”
“We need to move to the next phase of research. Today. Now.”
“Wait, wait,” Roger said. “It’s too early — I mean, Dr. Canavero was supposed to have a scheduled call —“
"I was just on the phone with him," Lars snapped. "He informed me that there have been delays and that he is choosing to hesitate instead of choosing to push forward."
“And you told him —“
“I told him nothing,” Lars said, recalling how he’d hung up on his head physician in mid-sentence. “But as I recall, I’m in charge of this research. I’m responsible for its success.”
“Yes, but —“
“I need you to explain to Canavero how important this test is. How crucial it is to our success. Without a successful trial this week, our research is thrown back months. Potentially years.”
Dietrich’s jaw and jowls danced along as he nodded to Lars’ words. His tiny, beady eyes bore into Lars’ soul, seeing and understanding exactly what his boss was telling him. His assistant was a man of many talents, but it was his loyalty to his boss and the company that Lars cared about most.
“I understand. I’ll have a word with the team.”
Lars nodded once. “This needs to be finished this week. It must be.”
Dietrich’s face remained blank, expressionless. Those eyes kept boring into him. Reading him.
Lars felt his hands beginning to shake.
“Dietrich,” he said, his voice nearly a whisper, “this must be completed on time. Do you understand?”
Dietrich stared at him longer, then finally swallowed. “Yes. Yes, I do.”
“Good,” Lars said, gathering himself. “Get to work. I must be in Bern by tomorrow morning, so I’m going to prepare. You have my full authority to do what it takes to get this process moving once again.”
