Covah hands Gunnar a bandage. “An incredible machine, wouldn’t you agree?”
Gunnar winces as he covers the wound. “Not much of a bedside manner.”
Covah picks up the tiny wafer-thin transmitter and washes the blood off in a nearby sink. He examines it under an inspection lamp. “Clever. I give the NSA staff credit. Sorceress would have discovered most tracking devices the moment you set foot on the ship.” He pockets the device, then heads for the door marked LAB and enters.
The laboratory is a brightly lit chamber festooned with equipment racks and dedicated computers, all anchored to the tile floor, which is crisscrossed with metal tracks. A small robotic drone, its gears fitted within the tracks, remains inanimate along the far wall in front of the door to a tall aluminum walk-in refrigerator.
Simon Covah’s eyes glaze over as the image jars a distant memory.
You are a rogue, traveling in a vacuum of misery. Like a magnet to steel, the victims of oppression seem to find you wherever you go. The Albanian physician, Tafili, introduces you to the Chinese dissident, Chau, who brings you to a group of genetic scientists in Toronto, Canada—the forefathers of immunology. The team is an oasis to your desert of despair, allowing you to focus your brain on finding cures for disease, instead of the black hole of rage tearing at the pit of your existence. Finally freed from the intellectual bonds of Communism, you spend days and nights in the lab, dissecting the secrets of the human genome, one excruciating gene at a time. You are fighting battles on two planes now, making inroads in the war against one cancer, while the disease of hatred that threatens to destroy humanity continues to grow stronger all around you.
It is a hypocrisy that eats you up inside—literally—when you are diagnosed with cancer several years later.
Gunnar enters the lab, startling him. “Nice hobby room.”
Covah nods. “The latest in genome-based technology.” He points to a large boxlike machine connected to a computer terminal at the center of the chamber. “Let’s say you were interested in finding a cure for some disease … for instance—cancer. The first step would be to have Sorceress access its genome database for snippets of DNA that resemble the enzymes of the specific disease we’re targeting. Once the search is completed, the computer extracts the actual DNA fragments cataloged in the lab’s freezer.” He points to the eight-foot-high walk-in. “The freezer is stocked with more than 8 million samples of frozen DNA fragments, human, animal, and vegetable. The lab’s drone selects the identified samples, snippets of which are placed in tiny wells on these plastic sheets and fed into this machine here.”
Covah pats the top of a rectangular-framed device. Situated on its horizontal work desk are dozens of square plates, each containing hundreds of wells designed to hold DNA samples. Positioned above the first plate is a device resembling a giant rubber stamp, only its underside contains tiny needles aligned to the wells of the DNA sample plate.
“This is Zeus, one of the workhorses of genome research. Zeus uses its needles to extract microscopic droplets of our DNA samples, then adheres these extractions onto sheets of nylon paper, creating a microarray. Sorceress slips the microarray sheets into small test tubes and washes them with genetic materials containing radioactive dye. The computer then uses its ultraviolet sensors to scan for the type of cancerous activity we want to treat. By isolating the cancerous activity, we can take the next step in finding a drug designed to inhibit the disease.”
“You went to sea with a completely stocked lab and pharmacy?”
“Far from complete, but we have more than most.” Covah turns to Gunnar, the genius suddenly looking lost and frail. “I’m dying, Gunnar, cell by cell, a final, everlasting gift from the United States Army.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I think you do. Your Army was using ammunition containing depleted uranium, fifty percent denser than lead. Gave it extra penetrating power, according to DoD reports, specifically in its ability to pierce armored vehicles. Bosnia and Yugoslavia are polluted with its radiation. It contaminates their soil, poisons the groundwater, and concentrates as it moves through the food chain. Worse, my wife’s people inhale it as dust in the air.”
“The cancer … how long have you known?”
“Ironically, I found out a week before I was dismissed from the immunology lab in Toronto.”
“Chemo?”
Covah nods. “It’s slowed the disease, but the cancer has spread to my lymph nodes. It is only a matter of time.” The Russian holds up a plastic vial, examining a clear liquid under the light. “This is AIF, a frighteningly powerful gene that controls cell death. We were experimenting with it when I left Canada. Place a drop on a bone tumor, and it disintegrates. Place that same drop in your body, and it will kill you within hours. The potential of AIF and several other drugs is promising. Unfortunately, our knowledge of the human genome is still not enough to guide us.” He glances around the lab. “This lab is my last hope. Sometimes I feel like Moses … forty years spent wandering the desert, knowing I will never be permitted to see the Utopia-One fulfilled … my Promised Land.”
Gunnar wonders how many Egyptians died in the Red Sea parting. “Tell me something, Simon, what will happen to your mission when you do die?”
“David will take over.”
Gunnar shakes his head. “Bad move. You leave that egomaniac in charge of the Goliath and he’ll try to turn the world into his own personal Roman Empire.”
“David will be fine. Let’s talk about you. Tell me, what did your old friend General Jackson offer you to take this mission?”
“The usual bullshit. Full reinstatement with back pay. A nice public apology on the White House lawn thrown in for good measure. I told him to cram it.”
“Still, you are here.”
Gunnar shrugs.
“You came for revenge?”
“I came to retake the Goliath.”
“But you despise me for what I did to you … setting you up to take the fall.”
“I was angrier at myself. My life’s become one big lie. I don’t know who I am anymore. I took the mission because I had nothing more to lose.”
“But my goal … perhaps it justifies the means?”
“I don’t know … do I look like God to you?” Gunnar exits the lab and lies down on the exam table.
Covah follows him out. “I know what you’re feeling. Anger has pushed you beyond pain, leaving in its place a void—an anguish so heavy it feels like it’s dragging you down, like you’re drowning in it. You have no hopes, no aspirations. You’ve become one of the walking dead, existing in a rut—what I call an open-ended grave. You’re simply waiting to be buried.”
Covah leans against the table. “You and I share so much. Two disenchanted soldiers who lost their country. Two freedom fighters who have seen too much bloodshed. Two men of morality who have been betrayed. Circumstances have robbed us of our families and dignity, yet together, we helped create this vessel—a vessel that may lead to both our salvations.”
Gunnar stares at the ceiling. “I don’t see how.”
Covah places a hand on Gunnar’s shoulder. “Come with me. I want to show you something.”
ATTENTION.
Thomas Chau opens his eyes groggily, wondering why he is still alive. His hands and feet are numb, still immobilized within the vice-like manacles that suspend him off the floor as if he were crucified. He cannot move his head, but he feels dried blood, caked on his face and neck.
Looking down, he sees his shirt, now stained with blood and a thin, mucuslike liquid. Glancing up, he sees a sensor orb staring back at him from the ceiling. He can no longer see the robotic limb and its electric saw. He is no longer in pain, but he can feel strange sensations along his hairline, pinpricks of discomfort, coupled with waves of nausea.