Veil (9 page)

Schaffer consoled the General and said he
realized all that stupid ass kidnapping was not what the General,
or the military as a whole, had in mind for Veil. At all. Yup, he
told the General, he knew it sucked, but there it was, the bad
news.

Call it a moment of overzealousness; call it
his ego momentarily winning out. Whatever you called the good news,
Schaffer overstepped his own limitations and told the General how,
with a little more time, they could solve the bad news. He told the
General they could take Dr. Tsay’s research and redesign Veil from
the ground up, in order to make it not only portable but also
possible to deploy without requiring physical access to the
subject.

Schaffer assured General Coffman that,
because all they were dealing with was electricity, there were few
obstacles innovation wouldn’t eventually overcome. They could make
Veil pocket-sized and remotely deployable, Schaffer claimed. The
two science officers would do it together, and they’d design the
device in such a way that the military could use it to spy on the
enemy, easily and from far, far away.

Yup,
espionage
.

The General excused the two scientists.
Politely. He told the pair to inform him of whatever they required
to make the device possible. The General politely said to let him
know if they needed anything at all and *poof* it would be
theirs.

In his office, Schaffer thought about the
big, annoying pink cloud that still hung over their heads: the
brain. He bolted upright as his mind honed in on exactly how much
could be possible if any of them knew more about the functions—and
electricity—of the brain. He then tried to think of people who did
know more about those types of things. Smart people, who knew
frakking brain crap.

Schaffer jumped up, ran to his office door,
and rushed out of the lab. He moved too quickly for the sliding
doors and caught one of them with his shoulder, but it didn’t slow
him down. He ran through the research facility, all the way to the
administration building, and up to the General’s office.

Since Schaffer didn’t take the pause he
should have taken … he didn’t have time to consider what he was
about to do … so he didn’t realize he should stop himself from
doing it … and therefore, Schaffer threw open the General’s door …
without knocking
.

Schaffer immediately and breathlessly beat
the General to the punch before the shocked officer could speak up
in reprimand. “You said if we need anything to make Veil happen
then we should let you know?” Schaffer made sure to raise his voice
at the end of his sentence, to emphasize he meant no disrespect and
was asking a
question
. It wasn’t until he got out his
question that Schaffer realized what he’d done. He barged in, and
he didn’t even call the General “sir.”

However, it was too late.

“Yes?” the General replied as he put down his
pen and leaned back in his chair. He decided he’d wait to tear the
whitecoat a new one until he heard what he had to say for himself.
However, when he did tear the ladyboy a new one, it would be a new
one so big that Pollock would be able to fit up inside and wear
Schaffer like a skin suit.

This better be good, boy.

Since Schaffer knew it was already too late,
he went ahead and made his request.

“I need you to tell me
exactly
what
happened to Dr. Jin Tsay.”

K
en reached across
the table. A chunk of Suren’s long, straight, unbelievably
shiny
,
black hair obstructed her face, so
he tucked it behind her ear. She looked up at him with brown eyes
that were still puffy and wet. As cliché as it sounded, Suren
really hadn’t aged. Especially around the eyes.

Some of his other friends who also hadn’t
aged much still showed their years around the eyes. Not Suren. She
still looked 25, at least fifteen years younger than the two of
them really were. Suren still looked new. Young and new but
exhausted and despondent.

Ken suddenly felt guilty. He decided all on
his own there was nothing to be done about Jin’s murder and all but
told Suren they should give up on trying to find out what happened
to her husband. He was fairly certain that was not why he was the
one person she felt safe calling and the one person she needed. In
fact, when she called that night, she pretty much stated the
opposite.

“You said on the phone that I was the only
one. What did you mean by that, Suren?” he asked quietly and with
every bit of empathy he could muster. His mind was tired and
overwhelmed; it felt heavy and wet.

Suren sounded grief-stricken when she started
to speak, but as the words came out she seemed almost defiant. “You
… you’re the only one who can figure anything out. You’re the one
who can do something. The only one.”

“Do something? What do you want me—” He
caught himself and rephrased. “What can I do? What can I do,
Suren?”

“It’s clear what they wanted, isn’t it? Jin’s
work. This Veil thing. That’s what they wanted, isn’t it?”

“It appears that way, yes.”

“Well, if they took him away from me so they
could have it, then I want to take it from them. If there’s nothing
we can do for my Jin…”

“I never meant to—”

“No Ken, you’re right. There is nothing we
can do. Nothing we can do without putting ourselves at risk. Jin
wouldn’t have wanted that.”

“He would've never wanted you in danger. You
were his everything, Suren. I never saw him more alive than
when—”

Suren put her hand up, as if to say she
couldn’t feel that emotion and be able to continue, so Ken stopped
and allowed her to answer his question.

“But he wouldn’t have wanted someone to steal
his work and use it for something he would've never used it for
himself. His work was everything to him. More important than me, at
times.”

“So—so what are you saying? You want me to
steal his work back? From the government? Or the
military—whoever.”

“No, no,” she huffed out and almost chuckled.
“Not at all. We have his work. We have all of it. What I want you
to do, and what only
you
can do, is finish it so we can
share it with the world.”

“Share it? With the world?”

“Yes.” She was adamant. “The world. Whoever
is responsible for doing this to him made one thing clear: they
want this Veil thing, and they want to keep it all to themselves.
I’m not going to let them have it, Ken. And if you won’t help me
take it back, I’ll do it myself. It’s all I have of Jin. It’s not
like we had any … well, you know. We couldn’t have any kids. So,
this Veil thing, it’s all I have of him.”

“I understand,” he nodded.

And he did. He really did. He had some major
questions. Like why they didn’t come for the copies of Jin’s
research he kept at home, if only to check and make sure he didn’t
have any copies. Or how they didn’t know about the elevator video
feeds streaming from the hospital to the Tsay house. Or why Jin was
streaming them in the first place. Still, Suren was right. And what
she wanted was right. More than that, it’s what Jin would’ve
wanted. Hell, it’s what he would’ve wanted for himself if he were
in Jin’s shoes, or if he stayed on the project.

Suren leaned forward, put her hand on Ken’s
knee and looked directly at him. Her eyes were no longer puffy or
wet, and she no longer seemed filled with grief or nostalgia. What
she said to him was a side of Suren he’d never seen, and he wasn’t
sure anyone, not even Jin, saw it. Before then, there was never any
reason why anyone would have seen that side of her …
ever
.

Unluckily for him, Ken was the first to
witness that new side of Suren and the first to hear that tone in
her voice.

“They took my Jin. He was mine. Do you
understand me? Mine. I will get my fucking revenge.”

Ken never heard Suren swear. Maybe a “damn”
once.
Maybe
. He didn’t know what to say. He thought maybe he
was scared.

To make sure Ken understood, Suren repeated
herself. That time, slower and deeper.

“I will get—
my fucking
—revenge.”

Ken hated to leave Suren, but she understood.
If he was going to help her, he needed to return home and get
things in order before he could dedicate himself to Veil. He
couldn’t simply drop everything right then and clean up the mess
when he got back, whenever that would be.

He flew home the next day, met with his boss,
and explained the loss of his college friend. He possibly stretched
the truth a bit about how Jin’s wife was being threatened with
losing everything, being evicted, contemplating suicide, and oh
yeah did he mention … oh my God it’s the end of the world so I must
go help this poor miserable wretched woman right this very second!
… Oh, and
maaaaaaybe
there’s-even-a-dead-puppy-involved?

In light of the truth Ken possibly might’ve
stretched, his boss was understandably sympathetic.
Take all the
time you need
, Ken was told
.
All
the time
. He dealt with his house and dogs; he handed over a
lot more control of his personal life to his assistant than he was
ever comfortable handing over before. In six days, Ken was back at
the Tsay house.

Ken was happy not only to get his hands on
Jin's work, but also to have Suren's blessing. Blessing, heck, he
had her collusion. From what little he read as he skimmed over the
computer files while he talked to Suren, Ken could tell Jin
stumbled onto greatness.

No, stumbled wasn't the right word. It
implied luck, chance, or accident. Jin took their work and created
something so beyond the theoretical confines of their partnership
that it caused Ken to wonder if Jin would’ve made the same progress
had he stuck around.