Days' End (8 page)

February 1, 9:15 AM

Los Angeles, CA

Although Nysa had only been gone for a couple of days, Alastair missed her horribly. He’d had problems concentrating on his work all morning and had spent most of his time surfing the Internet reading news from around the world. Florida, California, Arizona, and New Mexico were all battling major fires that raged uncontrolled. Embers spit into the air were raining back down miles away, creating yet more fires for the already overmatched firefighters. The California fire alone had already claimed over two hundred homes and fifty businesses. Reports indicated it was only ten percent contained. Crews were being called in from other states to assist with the fight, but most had already sent what they could to one fire or another. The wildfire in Florida was currently the longest burning as it had been started almost two months ago. It had very quickly been determined to be the act of an arsonist and, although there were currently no suspects announced in the case, police insisted they were in possession of considerable evidence and it would only be a matter of time before a suspect was announced, arrested, and charges were filed. In South America, slash and burn farmers had lost control of their “burn” and had now managed to reduce roughly one hundred thousand acres of the rainforest to smoldering ash. Professional firefighters and equipment from all over the world were being flown in to assist in the efforts. Very little was actually being accomplished though. For every piece that the crews got contained, two more would break out down the line due to gusting winds and the difficult, uneven terrain. The only hope in sight was a storm that was expected to arrive later in the week.

“Well done, jackasses,” muttered Alastair. “I hope they can put the fire out before you destroy another hundred thousand.”

Rioting in Somalia, civil war in South Africa, and yet another fire sweeping through southern Russia. Alastair, tired of the bad news, locked his terminal and went downstairs for a cigarette.

February 15, 8:00 AM

Outside Castle Rock, CO

She had spent the previous two weeks breaking down the samples, putting them in test tubes, extracting the DNA, centrifuging to isolate it, and repeating the process all over again. It was a blur of digest buffers, Proteinase K, Phenolchloroform, and centricons. Because of the improvements she had made in the Capillary Electrofreeze process, she was able to isolate and extract almost ten times the amount of DNA traditional means would produce.

After twelve days of collecting the DNA fragments (she worked Saturdays but took Sundays off), she was looking forward to seeing what Dr. Leyden was capable of. She prayed that he was as good as he seemed to think he was. It would take a small miracle to put a full strand of DNA back together. The fragments she had recovered had been in very poor condition, very broken up. The sample was either extraordinarily old or had been stored in an extremely unfriendly environment. She had consolidated her samples down into a minimal number of test tubes to reduce the clutter that was beginning to overtake the many tables of the lab.

Nysa was sitting at one of the desks reviewing her handwritten notes and drinking a cup of coffee when the elevator gave its telltale ding. The doors opened and Dr. Leyden entered the room.

“Time for you to work your magic, Doctor,” Nysa said as he approached her desk.

“I’m not here for my sparking personality, now am I,” he replied dryly. “Where are the fragments?”

“A technician should bring them shortly. He’s retrieving them from the vault.”

“I really don’t understand why they lock them up every night. It’s not like anyone can go trotting off with them,” Dr Leyden replied. “I tried to go jogging the other day and almost wound up getting a body cavity search from the guards. Luckily, my charm saved me from such an unpleasant experience. Or maybe it was the chili I told them I had eaten the night before. Either way, my rectum was spared an unsavory violation at the hands of those gun-toting thugs.”

Nysa almost shot her Café Mocha through her nose at the image of stuffy Dr. Leyden lying face down on an examination table having his colon probed by a burly security guard. Luckily, she kept her composure as she was sure he did not find it nearly as amusing.

Dr. Leyden proceeded to his computer, sat down with his back to her, and tapped away loudly until the elevator announced the arrival of the next stage in the cloning process. The technician entered the room and again placed the materials on the desk in front of Nysa.

“Dr. Leyden,” Nysa called. “Your jigsaw puzzle has arrived. Hope you have some time on your hands, because this one is going to be a doozy.”

“Once again, Dr. Knight, my wit and good looks are not the reason I was flown out from sunny southern California to live in a dungeon, albeit a comfortable dungeon, in Colorado.”

Dr Leyden walked over to Nysa’s desk and picked up what DNA she had been able to recover. He walked slowly to one of the machines she had previously been unable to identify. Nysa followed him.

“What now?” she asked.

“With the help of this beauty here—no, not you Laura, the machine—I’m going to map all of the DNA strands you have so kindly provided. I will then use a program of my own design to analyze the fragments and determine their proper sequence. After that I have to piece them all back together and replicate them. Presto, chango, you can have as much DNA as you want.”

“Sounds easy enough.”

The look he gave her would have frozen a lava flow.

“For your information, even excluding the amount of work I put into creating this machine and the computer program I’ll use, I’m sure putting this mess back together far exceeds your capabilities. It may exceed mine. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do if we’re going to finish this project and get back home.” He turned his back to her and began to prepare for the days and weeks ahead.

Nysa spent the rest of the day visiting the other floors, helping out where she could. There were a number of preparations still being made for the later stages of the cloning process. She took Laura and Mary Alice with her as Dr. Leyden indicated he neither needed nor desired their assistance. They were glad to come along and help. The whole idea of cloning a human and being part of the process had them practically vibrating with enthusiasm, and although they were still a bit green, they wound up being far more useful than Nysa had anticipated. With their gung-ho attitude, they were willing to do tasks the others had been putting off.

During their rounds they encountered Nysa’s neighbor and new friend, Jacqueline, in the elevator. Introductions had been brief and most of the ride had been spent in silence. The two young technicians were stand-offish and avoided not only conversation, but also any form of eye contact with Jacqueline. Exiting the elevator, Mary Alice and Laura began gossiping about Jacqueline’s purpose at the facility. Nysa cut their debate short.

“Let’s focus on the task at hand, and not worry about the office hearsay,” Nysa interjected into the conversation. The two younger women stopped and looked at Nysa. “I don’t know much more than you do about Jacqueline, but I don’t like rumors and won’t tolerate them in my presence.”

“Sorry,” came the reply from the two assistants as they dropped their gaze to the floor.

“Just try to consider her position. She seems to be outside her element, with a bunch of people she doesn’t know. How would you feel in her shoes?” Besides, Nysa thought, nobody knew anything about anybody in this place. For the most part everyone kept to themselves, did their work, and returned to their rooms alone. Actually, for the most part, outside of the main lab most of the staff seemed to be spending their time going to the spa, exercising outside, or watching movies and reading in their rooms. Why should Jacqueline be singled out for scrutiny?

By the time they returned to the main lab that evening, everything was well on its way to being in place for the next phase. The one question that seemed to be on everyone’s mind was when would the DNA be ready? Only then would the subsequent steps be necessary. At this point, that question was in the hands of one man. When they arrived, that man, Dr. Leyden, was still sitting at his mapping equipment.

“You’ve got to be shitting me,” he said as she entered the room.

“What, what’s wrong?” said Nysa somewhat startled.

“This is a friggin’ mess, that’s what. Do you know what he’s asking me to do here? To use your analogy from earlier, he wants me to put together a billion-piece jigsaw puzzle—and that’s not the worst part.”

“What is?” the three women asked in unison.

“It’s like a picture of a black cat in a dark room. Fuck. Screw it, I’m done for the day. You want to hang around and wait for little Mr. FedEx Jr. to pick this up and take it back to the vault?” Dr. Leyden stood and paced the room, rubbing at his short hair.

“Sure,” replied Nysa. “You look like you could use some rest. Go have a beer,” she suggested as he entered the elevator.

“Or twelve,” muttered Mary Alice. “And get laid while you’re at it.” They all burst out laughing then sat down at one of the desks to wait for someone to retrieve the samples.

Although not what I intended, the results were quite entertaining. I meant only to burn down Mr. Thomas Farriner’s bakery in order to rid myself of a man who became too nosy for his own good. What I got was a brilliant inferno as the flames jumped from rooftop to rooftop. As exhilarating as the commotion was, my initial purpose for starting the fire was a failure. That problem was remedied shortly thereafter in a much more direct method. As an added bonus, my involvement will never even be suspected thanks to Mr. Robert Hubert. I’m not sure who he is or why he confessed, but he is to be put to death for the crime, thus bringing to an end any investigations.

February 15, 9:45 PM

Los Angeles, CA

Alastair had yet another crappy day at work. He was getting his work done, but it had lost some of its appeal. He normally got wrapped up in his job and the days flew by. Since Nysa had left however, he had been dragging through the days. The worst part of it was not being able to just lift up the phone and hear her voice.

He was lounging on the couch in his boxer briefs and t-shirt waiting for the 10 o’clock news when he remembered the box. He got up, went to the bedroom, grabbed the box, and returned to the couch. He shoved the McDonald’s wrappers out of the way and set the box on the coffee table. He didn’t know what to expect, but a shoebox full of envelopes definitely hadn’t been it. He grabbed the first one and opened it.

“Dearest Alastair,

I don’t know when you’ll read this but know that I miss you horribly. Please try to remember that we are doing this for us, for our future. I am doing everything I can to get back to you as soon as possible. I love you more than I know how to express. I hope to see you soon. Dream of me.

Love,

Nysa

P.S. There is a memory card also in the envelope you just opened that contains some pictures. Have very good dreams of me.”

Alastair put the letter back in the envelope and pulled out the memory card, turning it slowly between his fingers. He was about to get up and go to the computer when the top of the news came on. The picture was of a mountainside that looked as though half of it had been ripped off. Lava flowed freely from the gaping wound.

“Holy shit!” Alastair set the card on the table.

“Our top story this evening: A volcano erupted roughly 15 minutes ago on the island of La Palma at the western end of the Canary Islands. The volcano, Cumbre Vieja, has virtually exploded, dropping a large slab of rock into the Atlantic Ocean. Current satellite photos show a tsunami estimated at two hundred feet traveling at close to three hundred fifty miles per hour headed toward the eastern seaboard. The enormous wave is destroying everything in its path and is expected to hit the U.S. in a little more than four hours. Everyone within two miles of the coast is being urged by authorities to evacuate immediately and move inland. Let’s go out to the field to our correspondent, Justin Frame, standing by in Newark, New Jersey.” The image switched over to a young reporter standing in the midst of chaos. Although quite evident given the situation portrayed in the background of the video, the anchorman asked the question anyway. “Justin, how are people reacting to this news?”

Alastair stopped listening. What if Nysa was on the East Coast? He had no idea where she was, but if she was cut off from the outside world, would she even know about the tsunami? He had no way to get word to her, as she had no cell phone or computer that he was aware of. He stood up and paced throughout the apartment. How could he make sure she was out of harm’s way?

He stopped short. The tower at the airport must have some record of the flight she had taken. If he could find out the destination of said flight, he would have an idea if she was safe or not. After searching the apartment for five minutes looking for the damn phone, he finally went to the base to page it and found it charging on its cradle. He picked it up and called information. Having obtained the phone number for the Santa Monica Airport he dialed, put the phone to his ear, and waited impatiently for someone to answer.

“Thank you for calling the Santa Monica Airport, how may I help you?” a friendly female voice answered.

“I am trying to track down a flight that left your airport January thirtieth. I would like to know the destination of the flight. Who would I need to speak to in order to get that information?”

“You would need to speak to Tower Control. Hold a minute and I’ll connect you.”

“Tower,” answered a gruff voice on the other end of the line.

“I’m trying to track down the destination of a flight that took off from your airport, please.”

“That is restricted information, sir. I can’t release it without the authorization of the pilot or a court order. Are you the pilot?”

“No,” Alastair answered.

“Do you have a court order?”