Tripple Chronicles 1: Eternity Rising (26 page)

That
afternoon, General Pike had Camden Riles brought to his office. Camden had
never met the husband of the woman he had been sleeping with for the past year,
but he was not thinking about that. He just wanted to get back to his life and
his home. When he walked into his office, the look on the general’s face told
him it wouldn’t be a congenial meeting. Without waiting for him to make an
introduction, Camden decided to lead the conversation.

“How long
will you keep me here, General?” Camden asked.

“You and
Colonel Ganesh have conspired in crimes against your own government. That’s an
executable offense. So, as far as you’re concerned, I own you and I can keep
you here indefinitely.”

“Or else
death? Those are my options? Do you even have proof of this heinous crime in
which I’m being accused or does it just suit some ulterior motive of yours to
steal my superior mind?”

“Silence
Riles! How dare you stand there with your puffed up attitude talking down to
me. You’re lucky you aren’t working in shackles, you arrogant son of a bitch.
And I will be asking the questions here.”

“What is it
exactly that you want to ask then, General? Why your machines keep killing your
soldiers?”

Ganesh had
been keeping Camden abreast of the situation in the weaponry unit.

“
Uhh
..well
…actually, yes. Do you
know why?” General Pike asked, half hoping that the smart ass Riles wouldn’t
have the answer.

“Perhaps,”
Camden replied taking a seat and crossing his arms and legs. His smugness was
almost too much for General Pike to handle, but he gritted his teeth and asked,

“What do you
want?”

Camden
smiled, knowing that because of the press coverage on his space travel project,
Pike was unlikely to beat any information out of him. Cuts and bruises would
raise the public’s suspicion.

“I want to
go home…unmonitored.
 
Simple as
that.”

“That’s not
going to happen, Professor,” the general laughed with a hoarse voice.

“Face it,
General, you need me,” Camden said.

“Fine! You
can go home on weekends…with constant surveillance. But you are still a
prisoner and if I have to, I will end you and make it look like an accident.
And if you jerk me around, or give me false information about any of the work
you do for me, I will end…”

“Yes, yes,
and make it look like an accident. I get it,” Camden said and thought for a
moment.

“Okay, add
one night out a week to visit my colleague, Lee Tripple, at our supper
club…unsupervised…and you have a deal.”

The general
laughed again.

“Fine. Fine.
Take your night out.” Pike wasn’t worried about the supper club. Mace had
recently placed Enira’s club under constant surveillance because Lee Tripple
frequented the place. And he was confident that his wife would eavesdrop for him.
Camden also was just as confident that Enira would lie for him if he asked her
to.

“Now tell me
what you know about the biomer that our scientists don’t,” Pike said.

“Here’s my
theory,” Camden replied. “We know that once the biomer bonds, it holds capacity
for memory, meaning it will always regenerate back to its programmed form. But
I think the memory bond happens before, in its raw form. If I’m right, then
logic follows that biomer, in any bonded state, from the same original unit of
raw material, will recognize itself in any form, especially if it is gifted
with artificial intelligence.”

“Interesting,”
the general said, stroking his beard and looking very deep in thought. “So if
biomachines built from different raw sources are side by side, they may work
within the parameters of their programming and not synchronize and kill at
random.”

“That’s just
my theory,” Camden said. General Pike was quiet for a moment while he made some
notes.

“Now,
professor, moving on to a more pleasant topic; what is the status of our
‘simplified space travel’ project?” General Pike asked. Camden unfolded his
arms and leaned back in his chair.

“Still in
the theoretical stage. I need Rhys Krell if you have any desire to see us move
to a possible working model. I made that quite clear to Colonel Ganesh,” Camden
said.

The general
looked hard at Camden, trying to gauge if he was being set up, like bringing
Rhys Krell here would be a trick, or if he was serious about needing that
loony. Camden remained resolved.

“I will
arrange it so he is brought here Monday morning. You will have two weeks to get
what you need out of him, then he is going back.”

“It may take
longer than that. I mean, it may be two weeks before I even get a lucid meeting
with him,” Camden stated. General Pike shifted uncomfortably in his chair.

“General,
are you afraid of Rhys Krell?” Camden was smiling as he asked.

“What? No,
of course not. I just don’t typically house mentally unstable psychopaths in my
unit. It poses a threat for all. Not to mention that taking him out of lockup
will surely get out to the press,” Pike said.

Camden just
nodded, but did not buy it. He knew that the general had no problem with
keeping prisoners here, no matter their mental state…and that he lied to the
press on a weekly basis. There was something about Rhys Krell that seemed to
hit a personal note with the General.

“Well, I
guess I can only work with what you give me,” Camden said, not pressing the
issue. “Is that all?”

“For now,”
General Pike said. “You can go.”

As Camden
was leaving, the general’s door opened and in walked Mace Magner. Camden rolled
his eyes as he walked past him without greeting him. Mace gave him a smirk as
he approached the general’s desk. Officer Aldretti, who was waiting outside the
office for Camden, looked perturbed, like Mace had upset him before he came in.

“What
happened?” Camden asked Aldretti once they were in the elevator. “You were in a
perfectly pleasant mood when I went in the office. Now you look like someone
kicked you in the stomach.”

“No one kicked
me. And if they did, it would be none of your business,” Aldretti retorted.

“Okay,
fine,” Camden said holding his hands up as if to surrender.

Camden had
stopped torturing Aldretti with his words a few weeks ago. He felt it was
pointless and in poor taste to poke at such a beaten down man who had no chance
of keeping up with his wit. It was an indication that since his incarceration,
Camden had more or less returned to his old self. His emotional state had
evened out and he rarely lost his temper anymore. When he did, his anger was
usually directed at Ganesh, who refused to fight back. Camden longed to go
home, to have some privacy, but his nearly impossible work here fascinated him
enough to occupy his mind most of the days.
 
And now that the general was giving him a little freedom, he
felt a flicker of happiness for the first time since his arrival. After a few
minutes of silence, Camden turned to look at Aldretti as they walked to the new
‘Experimental Space Flight’ wing.

“You know,
for someone who continually overlooks your talents and barks orders at you
without paying you an ounce of respect, Mace sure does get to you. I think you
have misplaced hero worship for that man,” Camden said.

“Well, I
don’t care what you think, Professor.” Aldretti dragged out the word
‘professor’ to sound condescending. Camden chuckled.

“Just a
thought,” he said.

Mace sat
across from General Pike, looking both frustrated and satisfied at the same
time.

“What is it
Mace?” the general asked.

“The
programmer is trying to negotiate! Can you believe that?” Mace said.

“So?” The
general replied, “What does he want?”

“A coffee
pot, now, and who knows what else he’ll want later,” Mace said.

“Do you mean
to tell me that you burst into my office just now about something this petty?”
The general was now on his feet. “Get the kid whatever he wants and don’t
bother me with this nonsense!”

“It’s not
protocol for prisoners to make requests,” Mace argued.

“He has done
nothing wrong, Mace. We just robbed him of his entire life and all he wants is
coffee!” General Pike yelled.

“I’m not a
concierge service. Who knows what he’ll want next,” Mace grumbled.

“I don’t
care. As long as it isn’t communication,” the general said, seeing Mace’s pride
being challenged.

“Mace, that
kid has the smarts to outwit the two of us combined on his computer. We are
forced to trust him with very sensitive programming and I picked him for his
mild manner, just as much as his brains and experience.”

“I
understand, sir,” Mace said and dropped his head slightly.

“I don’t
think you do, Mace. Because if you did, you would be in that room kissing that
boy’s ass instead of standing here looking like I just took away your favorite
toy! Now go, and don’t bother me with this insignificant shit anymore.” The
general sat down and dropped his eyes away from Mace and onto some papers on
his desk. Reluctantly, Mace left to procure a coffee pot…and some coffee.

On Sunday
night at 9:00, Bearden showed up at Tripple Laboratories again…unscheduled, for
the third time in a week. Dana was glad to see him, if for no other reason than
he was someone other than Lee that she could talk to. Lee didn’t seem to pay
much mind to the extra time he was putting in, they’d had a productive week and
three pairs of hands were better than two. Efficiency outweighed prearranged
schedules. Dana, however, wondered if he was avoiding something, like being
home alone after work. He looked tired and seemed worried about something.
 
Previously, when she’d asked him why he
was there on Friday night, Bearden’s second unscheduled shift, he had just
smiled and joked that he missed her too much to stay away. Dana would have
tried to drag a real answer out of him, had they been alone, but while working
side by side with Lee, conversation was kept to a minimum so as not to break
his concentration. Surprisingly, multi-tasking happened to not be one of Lee’s
many talents.

Before
Bearden arrived, Lee and Dana had successfully transferred two of the embryos
into their new biomer womb environment. They were still alive, but it would
take some observation time to determine if they could truly adapt. They would
transfer two more tonight, the weakest ones, and wait a day before continuing.
Of the thirty-five embryo bearing tubes at the start of the experiment,
amazingly, thirty-three were still active in the project. Dana took special
pride in that success. She had pretty much taken over the lab’s busy work while
Lee devoted a large portion of his time to finding a genetic weakness in the
biomer. So, when Bearden walked in again tonight, Lee mumbled something to
himself that sounded like ‘Yes, good. Better productivity this way.’ and left
them alone to do the final two transfers, locking himself up in Lab E.

“Good night,
Lee,” Dana said to him after he was halfway down the hall. She looked a little
deflated knowing she would probably not see him again until tomorrow. And then
later, when Bearden left, her night would be completely lonely and probably
sleepless.

“Wow. I
can’t believe this is working,” Bearden said, admiring the biomer womb
environments. The cells had been spread thin enough that they were almost
transparent, so even though they couldn’t see features on the embryos in their
new environment, they could see movement and recognize distress.

“I know.
This stuff is amazing,” Dana replied. “I hope you’re planning to stay a while
because these transfers are tricky, and delicate.”

“If you need
me, I can stay…at least until Lee comes back.”

“Oh, he
won’t. He assumes that you are here for the duration. And that’s your own fault
for showing up like this,” Dana said with a laugh.

“I will need
to sleep sometime tonight,” Bearden said. “It was another rough week at work.
And I had to work through the weekend.”
 

“Why rough?
What’s going on with you? Why are you so tired and what are you doing here?”

“Whoa. Is
this an interrogation? Can’t you just be glad that I’m here to help?”

“You’d think
so, huh. But seriously Bear, what’s going on with you?”

“I can’t
really say, Dana, that’s classified. But I have been working almost twice as
much as usual.”

“Then why
come here? Shouldn’t you be home in bed?”

“You’d think
so, huh,” he said and winked at her.

“Hmmm,” she
said and looked at him with suspicion.

“I know, I
know, you don’t trust me, but if you remember, I
did
want your job. Can’t it be enough that I am just intrigued to
be here?”

“I guess
so,” Dana said, not feeling any less suspicious. “So, then, we should get to
work. I’ll walk you through the process before we start.”

“Can’t
wait,” Bearden said and the two of them turned their focus to the project.

A few miles
away, Camden Riles was trying to enjoy his last night of supervised freedom at
his home. He had spent most of his first weekend away from the TRU Building
with Ari’s wife and children. It was a sad reunion that ended with Camden
insisting that she take a generous financial gift from him so her family would
be taken care of.
 
Now he was
sitting on his balcony in the fresh night air with a drink and a smoke while
soft piano music played from his outdoor speakers. He closed his eyes and
thought about Ari and his grieving family. Then, without meaning to, his mind
drifted to thoughts of his Rosa. He could almost see her face and hear her warm
laugh in night breeze. He took a deep drag from his pipe and allowed himself
another moment of pain before he opened his eyes and shook his head, like he
could somehow shake the painful memories out. Twenty minutes later, he put
himself to bed, wondering what his meeting with Rhys Krell would be like the
next day.

Back at the
TRU Building, General Pike, Major Magner, and Luke the programmer were
diligently escorting their selected biomachines to the wing of the building
designated for their secret stash. Luke was awake and alert, having been
allowed to sleep a little during the day so long as he kept up with his
programming duties. The general and the major, however, were exhausted and
overly grumpy. They had resorted to grabbing short naps whenever they had a
free moment, which was not working out well for either of them. Luke had to
deal with the brunt of their irritable behavior, but being resourceful, Luke
told them that if they spoke at any time while he was handling the biomachines,
he would lose his focus and his control. He couldn’t believe that it actually
worked.

Luke had
also made a few more requests of Major Magner who was only willing to oblige
him with a scowl on his face. This didn’t bother Luke as he had worked under
the Major for a long time and had never once found him to be pleasant. It was
just his way. The one thing Luke didn’t understand about his ‘special job’ was
why he had to stay at the unit and not have communication, even written, with
his family or friends. He understood that what he was doing was classified, but
what harm was a letter or two?

Luke had no
idea the world thought he was dead and that he was fated not to return to his
normal life after this assignment. So, he worked hard and tried not to be too
demanding with his personal requests. He felt bad, though, about leaving Charisa
at such a critical time in their work, so he decided to send her a message
through his computer code to let her know he was at least still working on the
self-destruct programming function. He assumed she would still be syncing his
work with hers everyday, even if he had been cut off from the network. Luke
thought that if he did this, maybe Charisa wouldn’t hold a grudge when he went
back to his normal work.

At 3:00 in
the morning, in Tripple Laboratories, Dana and Bearden smiled at each other
with tired faces. Four embryos were alive and stable in brand new biomer wombs
and the rest were still alive in their tubes. They had not heard a peep from
Lee since he’d left them early that evening…as Dana had predicted, and they
were ready to call it a night.

“Want some
tea before you go?” Dana asked Bearden.

“Sure, it’ll
probably help me sleep better.”

“Why are you
having trouble sleeping?” Dana asked
,
pressing the
issue she had dropped earlier.

“I’ve just
got a lot on my mind. Work has been crazy since they gave me top clearance,”
Bearden blurted out as they walked into the kitchen area.

“Hmmm,” Dana
said, “So that’s explains it.” She put a kettle on the stove,
then
went around the corner to the bath and locker area to
wash her face.

“That
explains what?” Bearden asked and followed her. He leaned against the wall and
watched as she pulled her hair back and splashed cold water on her face.

“Why you
want to spend your free time here with me,” she replied. “You feel isolated
from your team now that you know more than they do. You know I can relate. I am
the queen of isolation.”

Bearden
hadn’t thought about it like that before, but it made sense, at least it did to
his overly tired brain. Dana dried her face, then grabbed a clean towel and
tossed it to Bearden.

“Here, it’ll
make you feel better,” she said and walked back out to the kitchen.

“Thanks.
I’ll just be a minute.”

Ten minutes
later Bearden walked out of the bathroom barefoot, with wet hair and wearing
just his undershirt and pants. Dana looked up from her teacup with a bit of a
surprised look on her face.

“You
showered,” she said, trying to focus on his face and not his chest and arms.

“Yeah, I
hope you don’t mind.”

“Tea?” she
asked and started to get up.

“I’ll get
it,” he replied.

Dana opened
up her notebook and started reviewing what they had done that evening, to see
if she could make tomorrow’s transfers go any smoother. They’d hit a couple of
rough patches tonight where the embryos went into momentary distress. She
wanted to prevent that from happening again if she could. Bearden had plopped
down in Dana’s favorite green chair in the corner. He put his feet up on the
small ottoman in front of it and was asleep after only a sip of his tea. Dana,
seeing him in such a vulnerable position and obviously distressed, decided to
be kind. She walked over to the surgical rooms in the lab and found a clean
blanket, which she brought back and laid over Bearden, who was starting to
drool. She couldn’t help laughing at this but tried to be quiet. Dana then
killed the lights in the kitchen and took her notebook and tea with her to
Camden’s office and closed the door.