GeneSix (9 page)

One time, when hooking up a new coffee maker, he actually looked at the globe and computed in his head how many scoops of coffee would be necessary to produce exactly the correct pot.

Jake Calder, of course, said, “Why don’t you just read the directions?”

The doctor looked at him in his slightly distracted way and said, “Hmm?”

She found this so incredibly endearing.

She had never told the doctor how she felt. She almost did, on the previous Valentine’s Day. But when he looked at her, with eyes behind which such a super intelligence worked, she found her knees growing weak and she simply couldn’t get the words out.

It was early Tuesday morning. She had a nine o’clock class, and then at one she would go to the lab and work with the doctor and Jake until maybe seven. Then it would be back to her dorm for many hours of homework.

She left her dorm at seven, moving at a slight jog. The grass was shiny with morning dew, and the sun hadn’t been in the sky long. She wore a navy blue sweat shirt with the front zipper pulled to her neck, and matching sweat pants. A wide white stripe decorated the side of each leg. Beneath the sweat pants were running shorts, and if the morning turned off warm before she was done running her laps, she could toss aside the sweat pants before she worked up too much sweat and dehydrated. A runner had to be careful. She would use the quarter mile between her dorm and the running track as the opportunity for a light warm up. Her pony tail bounced against her back as she ran.

Suddenly, a man in a dark suit and a gray trench coat stepped in her way.

She said, “Excuse me,” and was making a move to run around him when a second man stepped in front of her. Then a third to her side.

She stopped, not sure what to do, when a fourth was suddenly behind her, grabbing her and covering her mouth and nose with a cloth reeking of a smell she recognized as ether.

She was screaming, “No! Let me go!” through the ether-soaked cloth, as the world started growing dark.

Once she was out, one of the men draped her over his shoulder like a sack. One of the others produced a walkie-talkie from his coat and said into it, “We have her.”

Within a minute, a black Chevy Impala was speeding into view and coming to a screeching stop by them. They loaded April into the car and climbed in themselves, and the car sped away.

The phone in the lab was ringing, and Scott supposed he was going to have to answer it. This was something he hated to do, but April wasn’t due at the lab until one, and Jake was off somewhere still pissed off, not only because of the argument between them but because two D.T.D. agents had tried to arrest him the day before.

Scott doubted anyone on Earth could arrest Jake, if Jake was not willing to go with them.

A few months ago, Scott had had a discussion with the lunkhead in the president’s cabinet, known as the Secretary of Technological Development. He was not a scientist, as one would think such a position would require. He was just another sleazy politician who gained his position in the cabinet as repayment for a favor.

Scott had tried to explain to the idiot that Jake Calder possessed potentially limitless power.

“Scott,” the Secretary had said in his patronizing way, “nothing is limitless.”

“If there is a limit to his power, it is somewhere on the cosmic scale. Much beyond the comprehension of a normal human. Maybe even beyond mine.”

“Scott, you give him too much credit. I’m sure that, while as powerful as he seems to be, there
is
a limit. After all, just how much zeta energy can he possibly build up before it burns him out?”

The plebeian used the term
zeta energy
with a straight face. He always did. He was too dense to catch the joke behind it.

“Mister Secretary,” Scott said patiently, trying not to say what he wanted to, that the Secretary was a bone-head who was hardly qualified even to be having this conversation with him. “Jake Calder doesn’t
build up
zeta energy, or store it like a battery. He
generates
it. And he generates it at no cost to himself. His wellness actually increases the more he generates it.”

The Secretary simply could not wrap his brain around the concept of Jake’s power. Neither, apparently, could the D.T.D. It was a good thing Jake was on the side of good, Scott thought, using the terms of the comic books he had grown up with and which were still dear to him, otherwise those two agents would be dead.

Scott had theorized, though he had not told Jake, that Jake could probably fire concentrated blasts of zeta energy through his eyes if he tried. Zeta radiation seemed to be harmless to humans, but zeta energy, cranked up to a severe degree, would be of an extremely high temperature and might have vaporized those two agents.

Zeta energy seemed to be an unstable thing – the reactor explosion was one indicator. Unstable, except when it came to Jake. He seemed to command it, as though it were a part of him, which Scott supposed it now was. Scott wished he could understand how zeta energy really worked. He thought the answer might be multidimensional, but that would have to be explored at a later time.

He answered the phone. A man’s voice, speaking in the sort of professional pseudo-monotone you heard on police shows, said, “Doctor Tempest. This is agent Tomkins with the D.T.D. I wanted to inform you we have taken your lab assistant, one April Hollister, into custody. We are holding her for questioning.”

Scott drove a kick into a lab table, and a microscope balancing too close to the edge fell and destroyed itself on the hard tiled floor. There’s a few thousand dollars down the drain. But into the phone, he was deadly calm. “Might I ask why you apprehended her? Parking tickets?”

“Doctor Tempest, there has been a serious breach of security.”

“Ah, yes.” Still calm. If Agent Tompkins had any idea what this meant, he would be running for the hills. “You must be referring to the article in yesterday morning’s Press Herald.”

Tomkin’s voice rose. He was clearly pissed off. “Of course that’s what I’m referring to. Your man, Jake Calder, attacked two of my men yesterday.”

Before he could go on, Scott said, still calm, “I must correct you on that, Agent Tompkins. If Mister Calder had attacked your men, they would be dead. There’s no force on Earth that can stop him if he doesn’t want to be stopped. Except me. Remember that.”

“Look, Doctor Tempest,” the agent’s professionally calm manner was fully fading as his ire rose. “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, but I’m directing you and Calder to turn yourselves in before we have to get rough.”

Scott was almost unnaturally calm. “Listen to me, you low-life neanderthal. You don’t know with whom you are dealing with. We are titans compared to you. If Jake Calder and I wanted to, we could squash you like insects. Don’t ever forget that. Ever.”

There was an audible gulp. “We knew it would come to that. We knew the power would go to your head. Listen to me, you ingrate. Your experiments, all of the equipment you have there to play with, has been furnished for you by the United States government. Your very
freedom
is provided only at our discretion. If it were up to me, you and Calder would both have been apprehended and dissected long ago. You’re a threat to the security of this nation. You are both to turn yourself in within two hours, or we will be coming to get you. Is that clear?”

“Actually, I must correct you on a couple points.” Still calm. “One, I don’t really think anything has been furnished by the United States government. It has been furnished behind the backs of the American people, and this is a government, of the people, by the people, for the people, if I am not mistaken. But of course, I’m not. And if I were, you wouldn’t be able to discern it, because next to me you’re like a cave man with his fists dragging on the ground. Secondly, even though you may not realize it, my freedom is at
my
discretion. Thirdly, not only am I not turning myself in, but I’m coming down there to get Ms. Hollister. And if she has been harmed, you will wish you had never been born. Am I clear? Am I using small enough words for you?”

Tompkins chuckled. “How can you possibly come here? We’re holding her at an undisclosed location. You couldn’t find her if you tried.”

“Hey, computer,” Scott said. “Tie into this call. Tell me, where are they holding April?”

The computer said over the phone line, conversationally, “April’s being held at a warehouse at four seven three two, Commons Drive. In the back room.”

Tompkins said, “Wait-a-minute. How the hell do you know that?”

Scott said, “You would never understand the mathematics behind it. But don’t go anywhere. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

The door lock was clicking, and the door swung open. It was Jake.

“Gotta go,” Scott said. “Nice talking with you.”

The computer actually said, “Good bye, Agent Tompkins,” before Scott could disconnect the line.

Jake went to the coffee maker and poured himself a cup. “Is this fresh, or do I have to power-up before I drink it?”

“Jake,” Scott said. “They have April.”

Jake turned to look at him. “How much does she know about what goes on around here?”

“Very little. Virtually nothing. But they don’t know that. I kept her in the dark to protect her, but it appears the gesture was futile.”

“Do we know where they’re holding her?”

“Oh, yeah. They were foolish enough to call from that location.”

Jake nodded. “Your computer tracked the call.”

“Yes, indeed. Look, I know you’re pissed at me. I know you feel your life has been ruined because of my miscalculations with that reactor, and maybe you’re right.”

Jake walked over, a cup in one hand and placed the other hand on Scott’s shoulder. “Don’t take anything seriously I said yesterday. You’re the best friend I ever had. You know how I get when I’m pissed. I know it was just an accident. I don’t blame you for anything. Really.”

Scott nodded, the corner of his mouth quirking into a half smile.

“Now,” Jake said. “Tell me where they’re holding her, so I can go and get her.”

Scott shook his head. “It’s time for Plan Alpha.”

“And dare I ask, what that is?”

Scott began to pace. “I have been planning for this for a long time. Since the very beginning, really. I was afraid it would come to this. I’ve been kissing up to the idiot Secretary to obtain his funding, but I always knew there would come a time to move on.”

“Move on, where?”

“Somewhere else. It is time our operation became covert. We can no longer trust any organization or government. We never really could. You and I control too much power, and we all know power corrupts. I don’t believe you’ll be corrupted, because you’re simply too good a man. And I don’t believe I will, because my desires aren’t Earthly enough. My desire is knowledge, not power. I desire to push back the multidimensional boundaries and explore the universe. A BMW and a trust fund just don’t interest me. If they had, I could’ve had them before now.”

“So, when do we leave?”

“Today.”

“Today? I’d really like to talk to Mandy, first. I went to the campus news office this morning, and she apparently told them she’s been writing as Kimberly Stratton, and has left school. They said she could probably be found at the Press Herald office, in town.”

Scott nodded. “There should be time for that. Let’s step into the office. I’ve got to show you the schematics of some things I’ve been working on, and I’ll outline the plan.”

Jake could not even begin to guess how Scott had developed all of this without Jake himself even being aware of it. One of the things Scott had developed was the outfit Jake was now wearing.

A nylon jumpsuit, navy blue for the most part, but with a wide aqua stripe totally engulfing his right sleeve, crossing his chest, and dropping to his belt level. God-awful ugly, he thought, but Scott said he thought the stripe was
cool
. Jake was concerned Scott would be forever trapped in the eighties when it came to taste.

“Consider yourself lucky,” Scott said. “I really wanted to put you in a cape and tights.”

Jake wore black boots rising almost to his knees. About his waist was a belt containing, among other things, a small cellular signaling device. About his left wrist was a band containing dials and small gauges. It could conduct many functions, all at once. Not the least of which was that it allowed him a direct link to Scott’s computer, and the link was by subspace so no conventional device could trace the transmission.

This outfit had been treated with various radiations and chemicals Jake did not even know existed, making it virtually indestructible. Even though it was as flexible as any nylon fabric, a sharp edge could not slice into it. A bullet could not cut into it. Flame would not singe it. In short, Jake could power up and charge through a concrete wall without having to be concerned about his clothing being torn away.

“Nobody likes a naked superhero,” Scott said, “unless her name is Wonder Woman.”

Despite the use of the term
superhero
, which Jake despised, he found himself having to laugh.