The Good Reaper (19 page)

“Yes. Luke from the hospital organized the whole thing. Luke
was in patient transport but he knew people involved in experimental treatments
in Germany.”

“But why couldn’t you let us know where you were in
Germany?” LeAnne’s mother asked.

“The doctor and the treatment are kind of underground. His
treatments haven’t been approved yet so we had to keep it a secret.”

“So we owe a world of gratitude to the doctor in Germany and
to this Luke person who organized the whole thing,” Roy said.

“Yes. If it wasn’t for Luke, I probably wouldn’t be here
now.”

“So where is he?” Roy asked. “He is obviously someone who
cares about you. He must have made huge sacrifices to arrange this. Can we
thank him? I’m assuming you are in touch with him.”

LeAnne had to think fast again. “I guess eventually you can
talk to him. He had to go home for a while. His mother is ill.”

“Okay then as soon as it is possible, please let us
talk
to him. He is welcome here anytime,” Carl said. “I
vaguely remember him at the hospital. He seemed nice.”

LeAnne settled into her old bedroom and the visitors began coming
to greet LeAnne. It seemed they couldn’t wait to see her healthy. The Pearson
family treated LeAnne like a celebrity queen while entertaining all the distant
family and friends who trickled in almost every day. It was like old times only
better. The awkward teenage years had come and gone and Roy and LeAnne just
loved being together again. Things were back to normal. They were better than
normal. Carl and Madeline seemed happier than ever before. LeAnne was glad that
no one questioned her extensively about the treatment that cured her. They were
all so happy she was better that they just didn’t seem to care how it happened.

After a few months, the topic of LeAnne’s treatment in
Germany never even came up. LeAnne kept her promise to Naos and her secret
close to her chest. She knew that the only person who could expose her secret
was light years away on a far distant planet. She couldn’t have ever imagined
in her wildest dreams what the future would bring.

Cooper had about fifteen dschubbas left on his sentence when
I arrived at
Baten
Kaitos
.
I had always wondered how he felt about LeAnne and
I
escaping while he was arrested and sent back to Ranjisan to serve a two year
sentence. But in the long run, things had turned out better for him. He only
had to serve two years. I was sentenced to three years. But I never regretted
it for one moment.

From the moment they took me away from our home in Idaho
City, a deep melancholy seemed to settle in my chest making it harder to
breathe. I found myself taking deep breaths which caused a sharp pain in my
chest. I found it difficult to move or talk. I understood. It was such a final
devastating feeling, knowing that I would never see LeAnne again. I remembered
that feeling and it never seemed to leave me. It always lingered there, just
below the surface. 

It seemed every kilometer we sailed back to Ranjisan
intensified the feeling of melancholy as I was acutely aware of traveling
further and further from LeAnne. But when they locked the cell door behind me
that first day it was the lowest feeling I had ever had. I was alone and
miserable and scared and all I could think about was LeAnne. But I never
regretted what I had done. The one thing that gave me strength
was knowing
that far away on a distant planet LeAnne was
alive and well. I wondered if she missed me as much as I missed her but it was
comforting knowing that she had her family. She would be alright. She was
surrounded by her loving family. Life would go on for LeAnne and I hoped with
all my heart that she would be happy.

The trial didn’t last long since I pleaded guilty. My guilty
plea statement came with a rebellious speech about why we should be sharing our
medical advances with the human race. Here is an excerpt from it:

Members of the
Baten
Kaitos
Judgment Panel, officers of the CIPE Code
Exaction Forces and CIPE representatives, I have pleaded guilty and I accept my
punishment without reservation. I would like you to know that my decision to
break CIPE protocol did not come without many hours of mental anguish. I am not
a rebel and I do hold CIPE in the highest regard. I am thankful for the
opportunity to serve CIPE. I also know that I was taught not to get too
emotionally attached to humans who are suffering and dying. In theory, that is
not difficult. But when you are actually with them, standing two feet away from
them every day and you hear them moaning in pain, it has a way of eating away
at you. It has a way of creeping into you very soul or as humans might say, it
has a way of creeping into your heart. Perhaps I was just not cut out for such
a painful mission. In any case, after spending a year watching my human friends
spend the last hours of their life suffering needlessly, I just couldn’t take
it anymore.

So, my crime is that I helped cure an Earth
woman of cancer. She was a wonderful, strong human woman before the cell
disease began eating her alive. Watching her come back from the edge of death
as the Zaurak gradually destroyed the disease was the most wonderful experience
of my life. She is once again, a wonderful, strong and beautiful human woman.
The big difference now is that she is one human who truly loves our people. She
loves us from somewhere deep inside. She is more than grateful. It’s almost as
if she looks upon us in the same way that the Ophiucha look upon the Aegiala;
with love, respect and admiration. She is one. There could be more. There could
be many more. There should be many more.

Why wait another five to ten years to begin
saving the human race. They are good people. I have grown to love and respect
them. But what is most important is the question of their readiness. I am
absolutely positive that they are ready now. It won’t be easy but I would like
to plead with the Judgment Panel, CIPE and the Grand Council to move up the
timetable for Phase III. We should make open contact with the human race as
soon as possible.

My memory is foggy but at some point during my statement, I
got down on my knees and continued:

I will gladly serve my time. I deserve it. I
broke the law. But please, I beg you to consider all the human lives who are at
this very moment, suffering. When you go to sleep tonight, just for one night,
imagine a young child suffering from a cell cloning disease or a parasitic disease.
We could begin Phase III now. If we do, we may be in time to save the innocent
child you imagined. Let’s not wait any longer to begin saving lives.
    

Each time I glanced over toward the Judgment Panel, two of
judges always appeared sympathetic. For a time I actually thought there was a
possibility that I would be set free or put on probation, but my instincts were
wrong. I was sentenced to three years at the minimum security prison at
Baten
Kaitos
.
Baten
Kaitos
was part of a vast prison system complex on an
island in the
Zavijah
Sea.
Baten
Kaitos
also had four maximum security prisons and two
additional minimum security prisons.

On the day of my arrival, I looked down from the air-transport
as we floated over the farm area and vegetable garden. After the orientation I
was assigned to a 2-man cell and although the feeling of being a captive
prisoner was frightening and depressing, I was glad I was serving my sentence
on Ranjisan instead of on Earth. On Ranjisan everyone looks basically the same.
There are no racial or religious divides. I was sure there would be cliques,
but at least I wouldn’t immediately be a target based on my physical
appearance. The first thing I planned to do to fit in better was to cut my hair
short. The color of my hair was already turning back to normal as the bleached
white roots were overtaken by my boring brown color.

I found Cooper on my second day at
Baten
.
I began scanning the dining room as soon as I walked in, wanting to locate him
before I got on the food line. It took a few minutes but I thought I saw him
right about in the middle of the room. He was facing the opposite direction but
I could see the side of his face. I walked down the center aisle until I was
just past the row of tables he was sitting at. He was talking to someone on the
opposite side of the table. I was sure it was him. There didn’t appear to be
anywhere to sit there at his table so I decided to eat quickly and then walk
over to his table to talk to him. 

When I approached his table a little while
later, he didn’t seem surprised to see me.
Although I never really
expected him to be resentful of me for fleeing while he was getting arrested, I
was still relieved to see his big, warm smile. The other prisoners all turned
and stared at me blankly.
“Naos.
I heard you were
here,” Cooper said. “Good to see you, although I would prefer that you were
never caught and you weren’t here.”

“Yes I understand Algol.”

Algol motioned to me to wait a minute while he took a few
more bites of some sort of stew-like concoction. After excusing himself from
the table, Algol guided me to the outdoor yard that was attached to the far end
of the dining room. When I stepped through the large double doors, the heat hit
me. We were approaching dschubbas 9 and although it was early in the morning,
it felt like it was already well over 100 Earth degrees. “Holy shit,” I said.
“I can’t remember the last time I was actually outside during month 9.”

“Still talking and thinking like a human I see,” Algol said
with a smile.

“Yes, I now speak
Humamjisi
or is
it
Ranuman
or something like that?” We laughed a
little and then Algol’s expression changed to look more serious.

“How was LeAnne when they arrested you? Do you think she
will be alright?”

“There was no contact with her after they arrested me. I
guess she will go back to her family.”

“So, I guess we have Manny to thank for this. What an
asshole,” I said.

“It’s getting hotter by the second Naos, but I do want to tell
you something,” Algol said. “It wasn’t Manny who sold us out. It was Arkab.”

I was speechless. It took me completely by surprise.
“Arkab,” I mumbled as sweat began dripping down into my eyes. “I can’t believe
it. I thought he would have been the last person to rat us out. He was so
involved in Blair McFadden’s Tseen Ke. I thought he really believed in the
group’s mission”

“Arkab was the first one from the group that CIPE arrested.
We still don’t know how they found out. The CIPE police said something during
my arrest interview about Blair McFadden’s mother. I think maybe she knew
something and she told the police. That may have sparked an investigation.
Maybe the human police brought Arkab in for questioning and the CIPE security
forces got wind of it and started their own investigation into Arkab’s
involvement in Blair’s death. It’s the best theory I can come up with. Anyway,
I think the CIPE people eventually coerced Arkab into giving up all the info on
the group in return for dropping charges against him.”

“Well, I guess I can’t really be mad at him. People do what
they have to in times of extreme fear. Fear of prison is a great motivator.”

“I agree Naos. It’s not like we are thieves. We were guided
by our consciences to do what we thought was right.” 

“Let’s get back inside before we pass out,” Algol said.
“I’ll look for you at dinner tomorrow.”

***

 My cellmate
Tyl
came from
Dheneb
which was one of the three largest cities on
Ranjisan. Naturally one of the first things you do when you are incarcerated is
ask the most commonly asked question by prisoners, “So what are you in for?”
Tyl
claimed that he was in prison for taking the rap for
the company he worked for. Etamin is the pharmaceutical company that paved the
way to curing diseases of the mind. Etamin’s Tamineisa product had been tested
for twelve years before being prescribed by doctors. Tamineisa was first
introduced as a series of injections that reversed the effects of dementia and
the Ranjisi version of Alzheimer’s. More recently Tamineisa was introduced as a
vaccine, similar to human Tetanus shots that have to be re-administered
periodically. Etamin was at the time of this writing, one of the top 100
companies on Ranjisan. As one of the Etamin’s top tier of senior accountants,
Tyl
was accused along with six other accountants of the
Ranjisan version of corporate tax fraud. It was something to do with hiding
money in the nonprofit research division to avoid paying into the public fund.
He still claims he didn’t do anything wrong. It didn’t matter to me. I was just
glad he wasn’t a violent criminal, although there wasn’t much chance of coming
in contact with a violent criminal at
Baten
Kaitos
minimum.

When I told
Tyl
why I was there,
his mouth hung open and his eyes widened.
“Holy shit.
I heard about that on the Daily Event-Cast. So you’re really him? You’re the
guy who went to Earth and cured your girlfriend of an Earthly disease?”

“Yes, it’s me, one and the same.”

“So what
are
Earth girls like? Do
you have sex the same way?”
Tyl
asked. My first impression
of
Tyl
was that he had a sense of awareness and that
would make him at least somewhat intelligent. His first question was probably
something that everyone thought about but not many people had the nerve to ask.
No one I had spoken to during my journey through the Ranjisan legal system ever
asked me about it but here was
Tyl
and it was the
first thing he wanted to know.

“How many other races do we know of
Tyl
,
I mean races of beings on distant planets?”

“Five counting Earth.
There’s the
twin planets, if you consider them two races and then the other planet where
they live underground and then there are those skinny little Grey people from
Eusebeia, plus the humans; so that’s five.”
Tyl
was
thoughtful for a moment. “I see where you’re going with this. All beings
reproduce the same way, right?”

“Well I don’t have any first-hand experience with the cave
people or the Ophiucha for that matter but I’m pretty sure it all works the
same way. However I’m not too sure about the Eusebeia.”

“But what are Earth women like? Are they sexy? Are they good
at it?”

“I’m not much help to you with this
Tyl
.
I only had one girlfriend on Earth and before I went there I only had one
girlfriend here and I never slept with her.”

“So you’re saying the first time you had sex was with an
Earth woman? That’s really something. You’re probably the only person in the
universe that can say that.”

“You’ve got something there
Tyl
.”

“But everything is the same? I mean the way it’s done? Do you
think an Earth woman would be able to get pregnant by one of us?”

“Yes
Tyl
, it works exactly the
same. I think it’s universal. Just like the beautiful
Haedi
flower that sends its seeds out into the night air to find a mate, for a
species to reproduce, the seed of a male must fertilize the female egg. And
there is only one way for that to happen. But I don’t know what would happen if
an Earth woman were to become pregnant by one of us.” This time we were both
quiet.
Tyl
knew what I was thinking. I had only known
him for a short time and I was already sharing my deepest thoughts with him. I
was thinking that I was lucky my cellmate was
Tyl
. He
was a bit annoying but otherwise he seemed thoughtful and good natured. It
could have been worse.