Tripple Chronicles 1: Eternity Rising (9 page)

Ganesh
thought a few more minutes then all of a sudden, smacked his desk with two open
palms and said aloud, “Bearden Leitner!”
 
It was brilliant.
 
Ganesh
would get to Lee through the eager scientist.
 
He pulled out a new piece of paper from his desk to work on
a recommendation for the naive sergeant.
 
He felt a twinge of guilt for what he was about to do.
 
It was a great plan, but if it went
south, it would destroy Leitner’s career…his life.
 
He shook his head.
 
It was worth the risk.
 
Someone had to create a countermeasure to the living weapons that were
being developed downstairs, in case the project got out of hand…which in
Ganesh’s mind was very probable.

An hour
later, with no call yet from General Pike, Ganesh paged Bearden Leitner to his
office.
 
An innocent meeting as far
as anyone keeping track was concerned; just a superior writing a letter of
recommendation for an ambitious young soldier.
 

Bearden came
bounding in, beaming from the excitement of his prospects of working with Lee
Tripple.
 
He hoped that Colonel
Ganesh had mentioned his friendship with Professor Camden Riles, anything to
give him an edge on the competition.

“Good
afternoon, Sergeant.”

“Hello
again, sir.
 
I was happy to get
your page.
 
I really appreciate
your vote of confidence.”

Ganesh could
only half smile.

“Yes, well,
you seem opportunistic and without fear…
almost
to a fault
. ”
 
He finished the
sentence in his head.

Bearden
looked a little confused at the Colonel’s choice of adjectives to describe a
lab assistant’s position.
 
Ganesh
nervously handed him an envelope. It was sealed and on the outside it read:

For Lee Tripple Only

“Son, I
don’t want you to forget that I did this for you,” Ganesh said quite
seriously.
 
His hand was a little
shaky when Bearden took hold of the envelope.

“Yes, sir,”
Bearden replied in a sort of questioning voice, trying to maintain his
gratuitous tone.
 

Before he
let go of the letter, Ganesh added, “It is imperative that this letter be
delivered to Lee Tripple, and Lee Tripple only.
 
It must absolutely not leave your hands until you
directly
place it in Dr. Tripples’.”

“Yes, sir,”
he replied again, with even more bewilderment.

“Can I count
on you, son?” Ganesh clapped his left hand on Bearden’s right shoulder in a fatherly
way, as he asked this.
 
And as he
suspected, it put the young Sergeant at ease again.
 
Ganesh felt Bearden take a deep breath and a smaller version
of his overly eager smile returned to his face.

“Of course
you can count on me, sir.”
 
His
hero worship of Ganesh returned and Bearden told himself that a man of his
stature must approach every task with this level of seriousness, even
insignificant ones like writing reference letters.
 

Ganesh
released the letter with a feeling of remorse that he and this young man had
just become government spies and allies, whether or not Bearden discovered his
true role in this whole thing.
 
Bearden put the letter in his jacket and patted his chest with his hand
to assure Ganesh of its security.
 
Ganesh nodded to him and Bearden took it as his cue to salute the
Colonel and take his leave, which he did promptly.

Ganesh
slumped down in his chair behind his desk.
 
The phone rang.

“Colonel
Ganesh speaking…oh, good afternoon, General Pike…3:30…yes, sir…I will see you
then.”

Click.

Ganesh stood
and walked to his office door.
 
He
looked out to see Bearden walking down the corridor.
 
He had essentially just forced him to work as a liaison for
Camden and Lee in the effort to counter what the government was creating.
 
Ganesh had decided for certain earlier
this afternoon, when he was briefly able to speak with Camden, where to place
his own loyalties and now considered himself a rogue protector of humanity. He
knew it was a rash decision to trust this kid and was counting on the
temptation of Lee’s laboratory to further sway the impressionable Leitner.
 
Ganesh felt even more guilt as he
watched Sergeant Leitner step into the elevator with an enthusiastic spring in
his step.
 
He had not intended to
turn this upstanding soldier and respected young scientist into a government
traitor within hours of meeting him...it just...happened.

When
Sergeant Bearden Leitner walked in to the waiting area of Tripple Laboratories
at 1531 Damiera Place, over an hour late, he immediately scanned the room
trying to size up the competition. He saw there were only five other candidates
in the lobby and wondered how many had already been interviewed.
 
Bearden walked over to the lady at the
desk to sign in.

“You’re very
late, Sergeant Leitner,” she said to him, while looking for his name on her
clipboard. She sighed, looked at the clock and noted the time next to his name,
which he could see had been crossed off.
 
Bearden smiled a pleading smile at her and could tell it made her blush.

“Take a
seat, please. I will call the medical examiners and let them know they have one
more candidate.”

“Medical
examiner?” Bearden asked.

“Yes,
yes.
 
Dr. Tripple has issued a
pre-screening for all candidates before he starts his interviews.”

Bearden
tried not to show the slight panic he felt on his face.
 
He had not counted on this. With his
instructions from Ganesh, it was imperative that he spoke face to face with Dr.
Tripple. That letter was the key to his success, not a medical exam.

“It will
probably be exactly like the government physical, which I passed with flying
colors,” he assured himself and the lady at the desk. She smiled at him, trying
to look unimpressed and nodded him toward the lobby chairs.
 

He turned to
face the lobby again and took a seat next to a studious looking, slightly
unkempt blond girl.
 
A couple of
people were tapping their feet on the floor while others were thumbing through
their portfolios.
 
It gave Bearden
more confidence to see that the others were nervous too, not that he had any
reason for nerves with the letter from Colonel Ganesh safely tucked in his
jacket pocket…assuming that he actually would be interviewed.
 
The chance to work alongside Lee Tripple
was a once in a lifetime opportunity and Colonel Ganesh had handed him that
chance.

Dana Hanks
stared hopefully across the long table at Dr. Tripple.
 
Of the six candidates who passed the
physical, she was the fifth to be seen.
A
good sign,
she thought, as she doubted Dr. Lee Tripple would waste his
valuable time interviewing anyone just as a formality.
 
As it was, he cut his candidates by
more that half before he had even begun his meetings.
 
The four people who had gone before her had been in and out
in
under
fifteen minutes. As they had returned to
their seats in the lobby, they were all wearing the same expression on their
faces; slightly awe stricken and just a little baffled.
 
No one had come out of the conference
room with an, ‘I just nailed that interview!’ kind of look.

Although
Dana also felt awe being this close to Dr. Tripple, she was comfortable being
in the presence of greatness. Her mother was a well-known author for a popular
scientific publication and her father was a well-respected scientist himself,
specializing in chemistry in pharmaceuticals.
 
This was not even the first time she had been in the same
room with Lee.
 
She frequently
attended lectures with her mother that Lee also attended, and had just watched
her father accept an award at the annual GSS ceremony.
 
She’d noticed Dr. Tripple that night,
standing in the back of the auditorium and looking uncomfortable.
 
He hadn’t stayed long.

Dana had
been sitting there for a good two minutes watching Lee Tripple, four seats
away, shuffling paper and muttering to himself under his breath.
 
He had not yet looked up at her.
 
Where the other applicants had most
likely sat in intimidation at his bizarre behavior, Dana sighed and stood up
thinking;
this poor man, he has no social
talent whatsoever.
 
He does need an
assistant.
 
She moved to Lee’s
end of the large conference room table.
 
He barely glanced up at her and pretended to be more interested in his
pile of notes.
 
How he hated being
rushed.
 
Dana now assumed that this
interview process had put a great deal of stress on him.
 
She understood the social awkwardness
that sometimes came with being a scientist who worked non-stop.
 
Dana sometimes felt she was well on her
way to the same fate.
 
She already
had few friends and no boyfriends to speak of, not because she couldn’t, but
because she chose to spend the majority of her time tucked away in a lab.
 
It left very little time for a social
life.
 
She learned this from her
father whose work had almost broken up their home when Dana was a child.
 
Fortunately, her father learned over
time to balance his work with his family.
 
Dr. Tripple was a single man though, and had no one to keep him in
check.

Dana sat
down next to Lee and put her hand on top of his.

“Is there a
particular paper I can help you find in this pile, Dr. Tripple?”

Taking Lee
by surprise, her voice was soothing and her touch was kind.
 
She reminded him of someone…from long
ago…perhaps when he was a child. Childhood memories were just flashes for Lee
and he quickly moved his mind away from that thought.

“Maybe a
dream,” he accidentally mumbled out loud.

This
statement confused Dana, but she didn’t show it.
 

“My name is
Dana, Dr. Tripple…Dana Hanks.”

That name
rang a bell for Lee and he shifted his focus to the interview now.

“Hanks, you
say?”

“Yes, sir.
My father is Garrett Hanks, the chemist.” Dana wondered if Dr. Tripple knew who
her father was.
 
Surely he had
heard of him.

“Yes, yes,
Garrett Hanks.
 
Fine Scientist!” he
stated as he looked at Dana, “and a good man, of course.” As if being a good
man was not nearly as impressive as his scientific contributions.

Dana smiled
at him and Lee continued.

“I assume
you meet my required qualifications for the assistantship.”

“Of course,
and I am eager to get to work as soon as you are ready.”

“I don’t
sleep much.”

“I can keep
up.”

“Will you
travel if necessary?”

“Certainly,
wherever you need me to go.”

“Will you
donate your own cells to my current project on a regular basis?”
 
Lee’s head dropped a little in
embarrassment as this fell out of his mouth. This was the first interview he
had asked this question and it surprised him when it rolled off his
tongue.
 
More unexpected was Dana’s
response.

“I will put
the projects in your lab first in my life’s priorities and do whatever I am
mentally and physically capable of doing to make your work a success.”

Lee raised
his eyebrows and cleared his throat, becoming even more embarrassed by this
entire exchange, especially since she still had her hand on his. Lee suddenly
stood up.

“You can
start tonight. 8:00 sharp! The lady at the desk can take you where you need to
go for your lab clearance…security first, of course.”
 
He wrote on a small piece of paper and handed it to her.
 
It read:

Dana Hanks

Level 2 Clearance Effective Immediately

Dr. Tripple

“I
understand. Thank you, Dr. Tripple.”
 
She stood up to leave the conference room thrilled that she was Dr. Lee
Tripple’s assistant, but she couldn’t help feeling that she had just vowed to
something more than she realized; giving up her soul perhaps?
 
As she left the room she gave a small
sigh and turned to Lee. “I won’t let you down.”

“Oh… yes,
then… right,” Lee mumbled after her and dropped his eyes back to his papers.
                                   

Lee picked
up the phone in the conference room and called the lady at the front desk.

“Hello, Dr.
Tripple,” she answered.

“The
interviews are complete. Anyone else waiting is excused,” he replied.

“Okay.”

“Dana needs
security clearance, level two.
 
She
is on her way to you now. See that she is attended to.”

     
Wow,
level two.
The lady thought,
this
girl must have impressed.
                                        

Lee hung up
and smiled to himself, filled with relief from not having to continue these
dreadful interviews, and happy with his choice in Dana. Again, for a brief
moment, a memory from his childhood flashed in his mind as he thought of her
and again; he ignored it.

Dana walked
over to the lady at the desk with the paper Lee gave her.
 
A gloating smile inevitably spread
across her face as she glanced at the remaining candidates in the lobby.
 
Another
one
, she thought, taking notice of the latest arrival, Bearden Leitner.
Cute too.
 
Too bad he's going right back home.
 

“Miss Dana
Hanks?” The lady at the desk extended her hand and Dana handed her the paper
with her clearance instructions on it. In return she was handed a
small computerized
key.
 
Dana raised her eyebrows and stared at the device.
 

“Place your
left thumb and forefinger on either side and press.
 
It will record your prints and be your access key to the
Tripple Laboratories elevator that will take you down to the security
chamber.”
 
She nodded slightly to a
small alcove behind a half wall.
 
Dana looked over at the brown paneled wall and looked back at the lady.

 
“It's there,” she smiled. “Just wait
until the other candidates leave before you use it.”
 

“Whom should
I speak to when I get to the security chamber?”

“I don't
know dear, I've never been down there.”

Dana gave
her a weak smile and walked to the chair furthest from the remaining candidates
and sat down to wait for their exit. They all glared at her, but none as much
as the new guy.
 

When the
lady at the desk made the announcement that the interviews were over, panic
fell on Bearden's face.
 
He stood
up and instinctively marched over to the desk, insisting on speaking with Dr.
Tripple.
 
It was no use though; the
lady at the desk was powerless, even if she was kind enough to help. Bearden
sighed, defeated, and looked around the lobby.
 
Everyone had left except for the girl Dr. Tripple had
obviously chosen to work with.
 
He
threw her a nasty look and stomped out of the building.
 
Once outside, he regretted his temper,
realizing she was probably the best way to get Colonel Ganesh's letter to Dr.
Tripple, aside from stalking the guy.
 
He paced up and down the walk for a few minutes and decided to go back in
and try to talk with the newly appointed assistant.
 
But when he walked back inside, she was gone.
 
He looked at the lady at the desk who
was looking at him with concern and caution.
 
She had a phone to her ear and Bearden got the feeling she
was speaking with security.
 
He
dropped his head slightly, smiled at her, and walked out again.
 
He did not return to the military lab.
Instead, he walked across the street and sat on the stoop of a neighboring
building to think.