She turned and met his eyes, then smiled. “I’ve decided to forgive you for being a rotten douchebag.”
“Good news for me.”
“Uh-huh. But you still owe me.”
“I do?”
“Yeah. Big time.”
“I see. And how can I ever make this up to you?”
She grinned. “There’s a heater in the Nuge. Wouldn’t it be fun to know you put Clayton’s pet vehicle to… other uses?”
He felt a tingly rush in his chest, a vibration that reached into his fingers and toes. In the Nuge?
“Uh…” he said.
She took his hand and led him back to the zebra-striped vehicle.
NOVEMBER 18: RUNNING OUT OF TIME
Implantation +9 Days
P. J. COLDING KNEW HE had said something very, very wrong. He just didn’t know what it was.
Danté stared out from the secure terminal screen, his eyes narrow slits of barely controlled fury. “I can’t believe you could be this stupid.”
“But I don’t understand.” All he’d done was give Rhumkorrf’s latest update. “Things are going better than we ever expected. The autopsies show incredible, healthy growth.”
Danté shook his head the way you might when you hear someone say something so incredibly stupid it barely merits a response. “You’re a smart man. Or at least I thought you were. See if you can guess which word in your sentence pissed me off.”
Colding’s mind raced for an answer. “I… I still don’t understand.”
“Autopsies!” Danté shouted. He banged his fist on the desk to punctuate each syllable. “Aw… fuck… king… top… sies!”
“But, sir, after the first fetus attacked the fiber-optic camera, the mother—”
“Spontaneously aborted, I know. Of course you do an autopsy on that fetus, you idiot, but how many more did you murder?”
Murder. Used in association with a lab animal.
“Two,” Colding said. “They’re growing so fast, Claus wants to properly document their development.”
“I don’t need documentation!” A thin line of spit dangled from Danté’s lower lip. “I need living animals! What is there about the phrase we’re running out of time that you don’t understand?”
“Danté, autopsies are vital to the long-term success of the project. The purpose of these animals is to collect human-compatible organs. If the animals are born and the organs have some congenital defect, Jian will need all the data she can get to figure out where that defect occurred in the growth phase. What if there are problems later on?”
“What if there is no later on?” Danté stood up and leaned forward. His face filled the screen. Colding couldn’t help but think of the fetal ancestor snapping at the fiber-optic camera.
“We can’t risk any of them,” Danté said. “We need at least one live animal to gain the support of the world and to get Fischer to back the fuck off.” Danté blinked a few times, then again sat in his chair. The back of his right hand wiped across his mouth, clearing away the string of spittle.
So much for Fischer supposedly not having a clue. Either Danté hadn’t been honest before, or something had changed. “Danté, let me talk to Fischer. I know him. I can tell him how close we are, get him to ease up.”
“Absolutely not. I’m not taking any chance he can find the project.”
“But sir, we—”
“No! He cannot find Black Manitou. Fischer knows about Hoel. Just take care of the project and let me handle the rest of it. Let me make this perfectly clear.” Danté leaned into the screen, violet eyes crazy-wide. “No… more… autopsies. You do not kill a single fetus, for any reason. Do you understand?”
Colding nodded.
Danté broke the connection without another word. The Genada logo spun slowly on the screen.
Colding thought about Danté’s reaction. The man was normally so composed, but he’d lost it. Lost it bad, and maybe said some things he hadn’t wanted to say. Fischer knows about Hoel. Of course Fischer knew about Hoel; she had been his operative. Unless…
Unless Fischer knew Hoel… was dead. And if she was, there was only one person who had the opportunity to kill her before Fischer could have taken her to safety.
Magnus Paglione.
But that was just a theory, and a far-fetched one at that. Thank God Magnus was far away at the Manitoba headquarters.
As long as Magnus stayed there, everything would work out just fine.
NOVEMBER 19: MOLLY MCBUTTER
Implantation +10 Days
IN THE C-5’S cockpit, Sara Purinam whistled the tune to “Cat Scratch Fever” as she walked through the maintenance checklist on her clipboard. She and Alonzo were doing the weekly walk-through of all cockpit systems. A couple of things needed work, but Big Fred was in solid shape. Even on a military base with full crews, C-5s were maintenance nightmares. Out here? Making sure she was ready to go on a moment’s notice was a full-time job.
“’Zo, you go through the comms check yet?”
Alonzo nodded. “Yes, genius. It was fine. Just like I told you when you asked me five minutes ago.”
Ah. That was right, she had asked him.
Alonzo set his clipboard in his lap and looked at her. “If I didn’t know you better, I’d swear someone fucked you stupid.”
She whipped out her clipboard and bopped him on top of the head. He flinched and laughed, rubbing the spot she’d hit.
“Ouch! I notice you didn’t deny it.”
She shrugged. He’d already figured it out, no point in lying to him.
“Sara, what happened to no way I’m hitting that again?”
“So I was wrong. So sue me.”
He fiddled with his clipboard. “Just… well, no one cares if you’re getting some nookie, but we all saw how messed up you were last time you and Colding danced.”
“Well, it’s different now.” It was different. But Alonzo’s concern made her see it through his eyes. She had hated Colding. Now? She wondered if the opposite was happening, and after only a few days.
“Just use your head,” Alonzo said. “I mean, you know, use it for thinking.”
She rolled her eyes. “Ho-kay, I think I’m done with your verbal diarrhea. I’m going to check the systems in the barn. You stay here and think about the things you’ve said, young man, and you feel shame.”
She stood and turned. He held up his hand and smiled. She gave him the high five he wanted. Alonzo supported her, but his concern made sense. Made sense to her brain, sure, but not to her heart.
You are in so much trouble, girl. You’re falling hard and you know it.
She couldn’t help it. To think the reason he never contacted her was that he still grieved for his dead wife. Heart-wrenching, and just so tragically romantic she could barely stand it.
Sara wandered down to the first deck, where Jian, Rhumkorrf and Tim were working on the cows.
“Good morning,” Jian said with a welcome smile. She was standing inside stall twenty-five, working on cow, well, Cow 25. The woman’s silky black hair looked patchy, rumpled. Colding had talked about the fetus incident, the hair pulling… Jian’s breakdown.
“Morning, Jian. How are you?”