BOX SET of THREE TOP 10 MEDICAL THRILLERS

by Ian C. P. Irvine

  Finally, there was just something about the Crown. Being around it was addictive. It held some sort of power over Don. Exactly what, he didn’t know or understand, but he had an overwhelming urge to keep part of the Crown so that he could keep hold of that feeling. Okay, so one of the reasons was personal. So what?

  The feeling of guilt was intense, but every time he felt the strength to tell himself it wasn’t right and that he wouldn’t do it, he had this feeling, this incredible urge that he should, and that he must. After three days of constant mental unrest he gave in. He would do it. That Friday. And then he felt peace, and a reassuring knowledge that he was just about to do the correct thing.

  .

  The rest of the week flashed by and Friday evening came. It had been an incredible week. Jason’s research was working out really well, and everything seemed to be on track. Barring any really unforeseen troubles, they would have rebuilt and reproduced sufficient quantity of all the chromosomes from the blood samples by the end of the month.

  In fact, things were actually ahead of schedule. In yesterday's meeting it had been agreed that Louisa would approach the usual agency they dealt with, to source and obtain five human eggs from suitable donors. From these they would take and enucleate the egg cells in preparation for the cloning process, with the goal that these should be ready in three weeks time.

  However, it was unlikely that they would actually proceed with five clones. The very special nature of the cloning subjects dictated that they would only proceed with one clone of each blood sample at a time. Only if either of the pregnancies didn’t make it successfully through to term, would they try again later with a fresh host mother.

  .

  As Friday afternoon wore on, Don started to get increasingly nervous. He was sure that Louisa had noticed his nervousness, because for some reason she had started to get nervous too, and by five o’clock they had both bumped into each other in the lab at least twice, apologising profusely and hurrying back to their work to avoid each other’s gaze. When six o’clock came, the Professor put down his electronic pipette and announced.

  “Come on team, it’s Friday evening, and I’m buying! This has been one of the best weeks of my life, and tonight I’m going to celebrate. Last one down to the Lamb & Flag is a Scotsman!”

  The last comment had been a guided one, designed to initiate a playful reaction from Don, who had been looking far too intense the whole day long. He took the bait immediately.

  “…and what exactly is wrong with the Scots...my father is Scottish...which makes me Scottish too, I’m proud to say...And how can you slag off the Scots when they are the most affluent and successful nation in the whole of the European Union?”

  “Aha…so the Don we know is still in there somewhere...just kidding young man, as well you know. I, for one, have the utmost admiration and affection for the Scots race, and before you start, yes I already know that they are probably the most successful inventors in the world. Anyway, if you want to bore me to tears again with your unending list of inventions that the Scots have made, then I’ll happily listen to you down in the pub. I can hear my pint being poured as we speak.”

  “I’ll join you soon, Professor. I’ve just got to finish up this run, then I’ll be straight down.” Don apologised, pretending he had important work that had to be finished.

  “Likewise!” Announced Louisa, not even bothering to look up from the microscope she was pouring over.

  “Come on Professor, let’s go. I’m gagging for a slow one... See you others down there soon.” said Jason, taking up the invitation.

  As the Professor and Jason made their way through the series of airlocks Louisa and Don could hear them laughing aloud and cracking jokes to each other. It had been ages since they had seen the Professor laughing so much, and it was a tonic to them all.

  Don looked up at Louisa. She was still working hard at something over in the corner.

  “How’s it going? Are you going to be long?” he asked, probing gently to find out how long she would still be working for. Don liked Louisa, but tonight her continued presence was beginning to annoy him. He just wanted her to leave as soon as possible, so that he could get on with taking the damaged thorn from the Crown.

  “Oh… I’ve got quite a lot to do yet…”

  “That makes two of us…” Don tried to hide the disappointment and annoyance in his voice.

  For the next two hours they crept round each other in the lab, each trying to find extra work to do to make it look like they were really busy. Don was getting more and more agitated, and even began to get wound up by Louisa’s continual calmness. It was almost as if she were so focussed on her work that she didn’t notice Don was there. By nine o’clock he could take it no longer.

  “Listen, Louisa, I was wondering if you could do me a huge, huge favour. It looks like you’re not working on anything incredibly time dependent. But I’m really stuck at the moment...I can’t leave my samples until they’ve settled down, and that could take another hour or so…The thing is…I’m absolutely starving, and I can begin to feel my sugar levels dropping...you must be hungry too…is there any chance of you popping down to the chippy and bringing us both back some fish and chips...I’m paying! Please?” It was a long shot, but the way he said ‘please’ so pathetically made it difficult for her to say no.

  Louisa looked up. Although her conscious mind couldn’t tell why, she felt an overwhelming urge that she had to stay and work late in the lab that night. She was not at all aware of the hypnotic programme that Mike had laid in her mind, but all the time her subconscious was preparing for ten o’clock when she would fall back into the trance, as Mike had pre-programmed her to do.

  Consciously, for whatever reason it was, Louisa knew that she must work hard. She knew she had to get her work done. She knew she would probably be working all night until the small hours of the morning, but it was only 9pm and she was hungry! She needed to eat. And the way Don had asked she couldn’t really say no. Could she?

  ‘Why would I want to say no anyway? In fact, why am I working so hard?” For a second her conscious mind began to question what she was doing, but the power of the hypnotic programme running in her subconscious took over, and reinforced her instructions. “No, I do have a lot to do…” she thought to herself, “ but I can eat dinner then come back later, when Don’s gone...I can work late afterwards...”

  “Okay Don…sure…No problem. Don’t worry about the cost…and I’ll treat you. It’s on me.”

  “Thanks…you’re a star.” Don replied gratefully. Genuinely gratefully.

  “I’ll be back in half an hour. Hold the fort!” said Louisa as she disappeared into the first airlock.

  .

  Excellent. He only needed ten minutes alone, tops.

  As soon as he heard the third airlock open and close behind Louisa, he went to the wall safe and opened it up, taking out the metal box protecting the Crown and placing it down on top of one of the nearby work surfaces he had earlier cleared for this purpose.

  He bent down and reached underneath one of the benches and pulled out a small protective metal vial full of non-genetic padding, which he had hidden there earlier. He opened up the big metal box and carefully lifted the Crown out of the box, putting it down on a pad of protective matting he had laid on the worktop surface beside it.

  Working quickly but accurately, he took a new scalpel from one of the drawers, slid off the plastic top which protected the blade, and proceeded to quickly cut the dangling thorn away from the rest of the Crown. The blade was sharp and it sliced easily through the dry matted material of the thorn's branches. The thorn came away cleanly and Don let it fall directly into the vial he held underneath it. He quickly sealed the vial and pulling open the top of his bunny suit he squeezed it through a gap around his neck and let it fall into his suit underneath, shaking himself so that it continued to fall down the contours of his body until it came to rest in the folds of cloth around his sealed ankle. Then he sealed
up the top of his bunny suit again and put the Crown back in its box and back into the wall safe. He put the cap back onto the scalpel and threw it into the “Hazard” waste disposal bin. It was his duty to take the trash out with him when he left the lab at the end of the week.

  All in all it took him only eight minutes. Faster than expected. He returned to his work, and when the buzzer on the intercom went a few minutes later, it was the voice of the Professor that greeted him, not Louisa.

  “I bumped into Louisa on the way down to the chippy. Forget the bloody fish and chips Don, I’ve got something to celebrate tonight. Get you and your backside out of that lab, we’re all going to Browns. I’ve booked the table…and that’s an order!”

  Don smiled. He could hear that the Prof. was slightly drunk, but he had got what he wanted now, and a direct order from his boss was the perfect excuse he needed to get out of the lab. Otherwise he would be stuck with Louisa for another couple of hours still pretending to be working hard.

  “Okay, you’re the boss. I’ll be out in a minute!”

  As he stepped through the final airlock, not forgetting to carry the bag of rubbish out with him, he was met by the Professor and a nervous Louisa who made a gesture of apology behind the Professors back.

  “Give me a second…I need to change. I’ve been stuck in this bunny suit all day!” Don spoke as he walked straight to the toilet immediately outside the airlock door. Once inside it took him only a few seconds to find the vial in the folds of his trouser legs and slide it safely into the left hand pocket of his trousers.

  He flushed the toilet, took off the rest of the bunny suit and joined the others outside.

  “And where do you think you are going with that?” the Professor asked sternly, pointing wildly in the direction of Don’s trouser pocket.

  “What?” he replied, a hot flush rising on his forehead, and panic blossoming in his chest. The Professor must somehow know he had the vial in his pocket!!

  “The rubbish....You can leave that here young man. We won’t be needing it in Browns!”

  Don laughed nervously, realising that he was still carrying the trash from the lab in his left hand.

  “Oh…” Don tried to muster up some sort of excuse. “It’s Friday night…I thought the idea was to go out, celebrate and get trashed!”

  .

  Chapter Thirty One

  Browns Restaurant

  Oxford, England

  .

  Laughing and joking they made their way over to Browns, finding Jason already sitting at their table with a round of drinks in front of him. Both Jason and the Professor were several pints ahead of the others, but Louisa and Don were both good troopers and could quickly make up for lost time. That wouldn’t be a problem. Don picked up his pint and waved it in the air at the others, signifying that one of his famous toasts was coming along.

  “Okay, team, I would like to propose a toast to the Professor, and to the success of his treatment. I don’t know what on earth they’ve been doing to him, but it certainly seems to be working. We’ve all noticed that you’ve stopped limping, and you’re looking about twenty years younger. So…raise your glasses and join me in wishing ‘Good Health’ to the fat old bastard at the end of the table!”

  Everyone laughed and there was a general murmuring of ‘Good Health!” around the table.

  The waiter came across to them, hovering in the background for a few seconds then stepped forward quietly and attentively.

  “So, does everyone know what they are ordering?”

  “No, not yet. Can you give us a few more minutes please” said Don, hurriedly picking up the menu.

  “Wow, I didn’t realise it’s so late. I’ve almost lost my appetite.” Jason chirped up from behind his pint.

  Louisa glanced hurriedly at her watch. It was five past ten. For some reason that time seemed very significant to her. It was after ten o’clock.

  “Oh no” she thought to herself. “I’ve got so much work to do…I really should be in the lab.”

  Without realising it Louisa automatically slipped back into the hypnotic state that Mike had placed her in the last time she had seen him. She could suddenly hear his voice in her ears, smell his breath on her face, sense his touch on her skin, and she knew that she had to do something for him. Something very important. But first she had to go back to work. She looked around the table at the others all burying their heads behind their menus trying to choose what to order. She knew she couldn’t tell them she was going back to the lab. They would never allow that.

  “Ouch…ooowww!” she let out a little whelp of pain, and grabbed hold of her stomach.

  The Professor looked up.

  “What is it Louisa, are you okay?”

  “Yes…ouch…no, actually I’m not. I’m sorry, I think I’m going to be sick…I must have got that virus that my sister’s kids have got. Excuse me...” Louisa jumped up and hurried to the ladies bathroom. She locked herself in one of the cubicles for a suitable amount of time, then came out and dabbed some cold water on her face from the sink in front of the mirror, and rubbed her cheeks until they were slightly flushed. Then she went back to the table, and picked up her jacket from behind her chair.

  “I’m really sorry everyone, but I’m just going to catch a cab home just now. I’m not feeling too great. Sorry.”

  “Do you want me to take you home?” Don asked, genuinely concerned.

  “No, it’s okay. Thanks. I’ll just take one of the cabs outside. I’ll see you on Monday.”

  She waved at Jason and the Professor, and left the restaurant quickly before anyone else offered to take her home. She opened the door to the nearest taxi and jumped in, leaning forward to talk to the cab driver.

  “Sorry, it’s not very far but could you take me to the I.G.E.G.G.M labs in Parks Road beside the Pitt Rivers Museum?”

  The cab driver snorted something behind the glass panel, obviously annoyed that after waiting for ages, his fare wasn’t going very far, but when they drew up outside the lab a few minutes later, Louisa stuffed a twenty pound note into his hand and told him to keep the change.

  The guard at the door greeted her warmly.

  “Working late tonight, Louisa?” He was used to the nocturnal comings and goings of the lab teams and never paid it much attention. His job was to watch the building and make sure that only authorised personnel came into the lab.

  “Yes...I’m doing an overnight run. Need the results by Monday.” She walked past the guard, and just before she got into the elevator, she turned to the guard and said.

  “Oh, and by the way Jonathan, my boyfriend will be getting back from London later tonight and I’ve asked him to stop by the lab on the way home. It’ll probably be about 3 o’clock. If you see him pull up outside can you give me a call on the Inner Lab phone? It’s his birthday and I’ve got a present for him!…thanks.”

  The two permanent guards on the floor outside the lab greeted Louisa as she walked past, and she feigned small talk with them for a moment or two. Entering the lab area, she made her way through the airlocks after putting on the bunny suit, and made her way over to her bench. She switched on a couple of things, to make it look like she was busy, then sat down on one of the seats and started staring into space. She felt very relaxed, even wonderful, ....and very content. She looked at her watch. It was 10.45pm. Plenty of time to get her work done before her boyfriend came.

  The hours sped by, and Louisa worked hard. Although completely in a hypnotic state she was behaving and functioning almost completely as normal, able to get on with her work and focus clearly on the task at hand with no problems at all. She had completely forgotten how hungry she was, and was so focussed that she was rather startled when the phone in the lab rang at 2.55am. It was Jonathan from security.

  “Your boyfriend just pulled up in the car outside. He’s parked on the opposite side of the road, but I kept an eye open for you just as you said.”

  “Thanks. I’ll pop down to see him.”
<
br />   She went to the wall safe, and opened it quickly, removing the big metal security box containing the Crown. She made her way through the airlocks, hurriedly stripped off the bunny suit, and scurried out past the security guards. They looked briefly at the big metal box as she walked past, but since she was one of the key managers in the building, they had no reason to be suspicious of her. When she got to the ground floor, she scurried past Jonathan out into the street, spotting the car on the other side of the road where Jonathan had said it was.

  Mike leant across and opened the passenger door as she approached.

  “Hi Louisa. Are you feeling good? Excellent…is that for me? Why don’t you get in the front seat for just now...I think the security guard watched you crossing the street…”

  He reached out and took the metal box from her and gave her a long slow kiss, so that the security guard would be able to see them in their lovers’ clinch.

  “You’re doing great! We’ll drive round the corner and then you can get in the back seat. You look very tired. Maybe you should sleep for three minutes.”

  They drove around the corner, and obediently Louisa climbed into the back seat, closed her eyes and went straight to sleep. She couldn’t see anything as Mike reached his padded gloved hands under the passenger seat and took out a flat box, from which he extracted an identical copy of the Crown of Thorns. He opened the metal box, and replaced the real Crown with the copy, tucking the original securely into the flat box under the passenger seat. It only took two minutes.

  Mike turned around in his seat and looked at Louisa fast asleep on the back seat. She looked fantastic and a sharp pain of regret shot through his chest. He wanted to reach out and kiss her, to hold her, and to tell her how sorry he was for doing this to her. He hated himself for treating her like this. And he realised that which he had feared for some time was true. He had fallen in love with her. There was no way that he could keep hypnotising her like this. He wanted a normal relationship with her, one where he could return the trust she put in him. This game had to end.