The Dane Commission (The Dane Chronicles) (19 page)

Ryan feared that he’d told the whole
story to the wrong person after all.

‘Damn,’ he thought while he waited,
‘this call wasn’t going as well as the London call, no sound and maybe the
wrong person.’

Hearing voices on his phone, he turned
up the volume, and realized he could still hear her on his phone, not well, but
enough to know that Sarah was rapidly discussing his call, and asking what she
should say.

When the screen came back on again, she
was standing with a gentleman in a white lab coat. “Ryan, I have you on the
speaker phone. This is Dr. Moore. He was with me when you called, and by
coincidence we were talking about an example of this very problem; our worst
case yet, and one which has only just occurred.”

Dr. Moore moved towards the camera and said, “Mr. Dane, am I to understand that
there are two other facilities experiencing the same problem?”

Ryan leaned forward in his chair with
heavy anticipation, “I believe the answer is ‘yes’, but before I go into any
detail, could you please describe what you are experiencing there?”

“Yes, of course. We have a 1%
mistreatment phenomenon for which we can find no solution. It seems that, at
random times, our practical researchers will prescribe a treatment for a
particular patient. However, the hospital services group receives a different treatment.
We have had our first near-death incident because of this anomaly just last
night.”

Obviously frustrated, Dr. Moore said,
“Now it’s your turn Mr. Dane, please answer the question.”

“Of course, the answer is,
‘Yes’
.”

That was all it took. The cat was out
of the bag.

He explained that he was calling
informally, and that he would need to take this information back to his
supervisor before he could share any more data.

He thanked Dr. Moore and Mrs. Warren
for their time, and said goodbye.

He then called Dorothy Allen’s
assistant up in Patient Services.

“Cynthia, I would like to speak with
Ms. Allen. Will she be available any time this afternoon?”

“Well, actually she’s free right now.
Let me check.”

She put him on hold for a moment.

“Ryan, yes, please come up, Ms. Allen
will see you now.”

When he arrived at her office, Dorothy
was eating a salad of some sort.
“Please come in Ryan, and have a seat. You’ll have to excuse me; I didn’t get
to eat lunch today.” He walked in and sat down.

“Yes, of course.”

“You look like you might have some
news,” she said.

“Yes, indeed I do, and I have reached
the point where it is appropriate for me to get new direction from both you and
Ben.”

Ryan started at the beginning,
describing the initial steps he had explored, including the tests he’d
performed with Jim’s help. He went on to tell her the results of his visit in
the labs, and in the hospital.

He paused and set his notes down,
“Dorothy, after thorough exploration it is my opinion that the systems, on both
the hospital and research sides, are secure. They cannot be broken through
conventional, everyday activity.”
”I’m sorry Ryan, I don’t understand,” she said.
“I didn’t either; I needed more information,” he said, “and that’s when I
approached Mr. James for permission to discuss the errors with another
IntelliHealth Facility.”

“Ryan, why would you assume it was
occurring elsewhere?” she asked.

“I learned from my support team in
Information Services that each Facility has the identical software employed on
the identical network set-up. It has been implemented that way for easy
collaboration between scientists and hospitals across the whole IntelliHealth
system.”

“So if it could happen here, it could
happen there,” she said.

“Exactly, Ben requested that I start
with London, and that’s where I learned we aren’t alone.”

Leaning forward, he said, “Dorothy,
they were experiencing the exact same problem. And what’s more, they gave me a
tip that it was happening in the Sydney Facility as well; a rumor I later
confirmed.”

He paused for a second, and let it sink
in.

“I can now say that there are three
IntelliHealth Facilities experiencing the same odd treatment errors, and I feel
it would be logical to believe there are more. The problem is not localized
here, and is unconventional in nature.”

“Ryan, just to be perfectly clear, you
personally spoke with representatives from the London and Sydney facilities, is
that correct?”

“Yes, that’s correct.”

“Okay, let me get on the phone with my
counterparts at both facilities and begin a formal dialogue. I will contact
both you and Ben very soon.”

Ryan stood to leave.

Dorothy stood up as well, “Good job
Ryan. Well done.”

After telling this story so many times
he was feeling a little fatigued.

He took his time going downstairs, and
strolled back to his office.

It was getting late in the afternoon.

Ryan checked his mail and replied to a
message from Jeff.
’Sorry Jeff, I’ve been tied up all day. How about that visit?’

Jeff must have been at his terminal
right then, because he shot back a response in just a few seconds.

‘Sounds good, I’ll come to you. See you
in a few minutes.’

Ryan thought that this called for a
fresh coffee.

While he was waiting for Jeff, he got
his coffee, wandered over to Jim’s place. Jim was hurling wadded up paper over
the cubicle wall.

Trying not to laugh, he said, “Hey Jim,
I don’t want to disturb you, I can see you’re deep into something very complex,
but when you have a minute.”

Quickly throwing the last one over the
top, Jim stood up and stretched.

“Sure, Ryan I’m at a good stopping
place,” he said grinning, “what have you got, more data tests?”

“Nope, I’m about to visit with my new
friend Jeff from the lab that I visited last week. I have much to tell about
our project, and since you said you like a mystery, I thought you might enjoy
it too.”

“Sure, I’m ready for a break, let’s
go.”

Jeff finished an experiment using an
applied method that one of his friends had written about. The idea was to test
for qualities of fertile eggs, rather than focusing on the infertile eggs. It
was a novel idea that turned the microscope around, so to speak.

Now he had to wait for the results.

He had received only one visit from the
‘dragon-lady’ across the hall today. Apparently, she wanted to know if his
group needed any extra glassware. It seems that in her re-organizing of her
side, they were getting rid of some lab furniture to make room for an
additional bench. Now they had beakers and flasks without a home.

Jeff was sending a message to his wife,
when he got the invitation from Ryan to come down. Finishing his message to
Kali, he shot a quick response to Ryan, and headed down to visit with him. He
was happy not to talk on this floor.
There were too many ears.

When he arrived, Ryan jumped up and met
him at the doorway.

“Jeff, it’s so good to see you. Thank
you again, for all of your help the other day.”

“Oh sure, did the procedure help at
all?”

“Well, yes actually, and I have a story
to tell. Come in, have a seat. Please allow me to introduce Jim Safe, ‘programmer
extraordinaire’. Jim has been helping me on the same project from the
Information Services side, and I thought it would fun to have you both here at
the same time.”

Jeff and Jim exchanged handshakes and
sat down in Ryan’s ‘visitor’ chairs.

As they talked about Ryan’s project,
they covered a lot of ground neither Jeff nor Jim knew. They talked about the
data comparison tests, and the walk-through of the actual hospital treatment
area.
 
As he told his story, they came
to understand the scope of the problem was bigger than they thought it was.
Then the bombshell.
Jeff and Jim were stunned when Ryan told them it was happening at two other
facilities, London and Sydney.

Jeff said, “I guess that makes sense.
The other facilities should have the exact same systems we have, including all
of our strengths and vulnerabilities.”

“Exactly,” said Jim.

“You know I’ve already told Ben and
Dorothy that the problem was identified in London and Sydney, and I expected to
see it elsewhere too. But what we should start considering, is that it may
actually be happening everywhere,” said Ryan.

Suddenly Ryan remembered something from
when he first started on this project.

“You know, I just remembered something
odd. When I was first being interviewed, SID joined Dorothy, Ben and I. SID
said that the problem was ‘limited in scope, and localized in proximity’.”

“Well, SID got that wrong,” said Jeff.

“Or he lied,” said Jim.

Jeff said, “SID doesn’t lie, but he does make mistakes. In the labs, we work
with SID every day, and I can tell you he makes assertions all the time that
don’t pan out. We often debate ideas for new experiments. A lot of times SID
will assert that if we try turning off a particular receptor, the trial will
work. Often as not, after the experiments are finished, we find that his idea
did not work. He is more like a colleague than an infallible servant.”

Smiling, Jim said, “Hmm, that’s an
interesting way to look at him Jeff, I think I like that.”

“By the way, I have a question for both
of you,” Jim continued, “we’ve been put on high alert for a huge ramp-up in
activity, apparently in response to something.”

He lowered his voice, “I’m hearing a
lot of weird rumors. Do either of you know what’s going on?”

Jim and Ryan both looked sideways at
Jeff.

“Oh sure, you both look at the Indian
guy, because I should know?”

They all started laughing.

Jeff got up and walked over to Ryan’s
window and looked out.

“The problem is that I do know.”

Startled by the sudden truth, Ryan and
Jim stopped laughing.

“Jeff… what did you say?”

“As your friend, I want to say that
what I know is terrible indeed. It has made me miserable, and it will you, too.
The news will work its way to the mainstream press soon enough. Do you really
want me to tell you, are you sure?”

Jim was remembering David, and how he
wanted to stock up on supplies.
He thought, ‘Damn, maybe he wasn’t so crazy after all.’

“Yes,” said Jim nodding.

Ryan was not as sure. He had a family,
and terrible news could threaten them all.
He nodded much more slowly than Jim.

“Remember that I warned you,” said
Jeff, and then he turned towards Ryan, “Ryan, you actually stumbled on this
before I did. You will have to forgive me if I don’t thank you.”

Jeff paused; this was the first time he
had told anyone. In a way it was almost therapeutic to speak of it, to share
the dark burden.

“Do you remember when you asked me
about why IntelliHealth had information on everyone who had been vaccinated?
You made the point that many people must be going to other places to get their
shots. Why then, would the local government and clinics pass those numbers on
to IntelliHealth?”

Ryan was nodding.

“The answer is IntelliHealth has been
working with governments around the world in an effort to gather as accurate a
world-census as possible. I should tell you that I recently attended a meeting,
where we were addressed by the actual IntelliHealth founder, Dr. Sid Frances.”

“What? Really?” said Jim excited.

“He told us that recent data confirms
the human population has become sterile. He suggested that we could disappear
altogether in only two generations.”

Ryan felt like someone had punched him
in the stomach.

He didn’t know what to say.