by Paul Anlee
Thirty minutes later, a voice woke him up. “Mr. Leigh?” Darian tried to nod and sit up but the spiking pain in his clavicle made him wince. “Yeah,” he grunted.
The orderly apologized for the delay in getting down to recovery. “No worries,” Darian slurred.
A junior nurse disconnected him from the recovery room monitoring equipment and prepped the bed for moving. The orderly keyed the new room number into the clip pad, dropped it back in the holder at the foot of the bed, and started walking. The bed followed him on its own power.
“We’re heading up to the sixth floor in the new Pacifica complex,” the orderly said, looking back over his shoulder. “You’ll like it up there.” As they left the OR recovery area, two uniformed policemen silently stepped into place behind them, one on either side of the mobile bed.
The orderly looked back at Darian who raised his eyebrows in silent question. “I guess they figure you still need protecting,” the man replied. Darian grunted.
His posse inspected the room and, finding it clear, stepped aside as his bed docked. The floor nurse arrived and reconnected the vitals monitor. Moments later, he was alone with the quiet hums, drips, and clicks of his room. Exhausted, Darian relaxed the lattice’s grip on his brain and he let himself ease back into a welcome sleep.
* * *
“Hello. Mr. Leigh? I’m Madison,” came a voice through the fog. “Do you need to use the washroom?” Now that his attention was drawn to his bladder, Darian realized he did need to go. He nodded—more carefully, this time—and tried to sit up so he could swing his feet to the floor. The room whirled, and he dropped his head back to the pillow. This is starting to get annoying–he thought. I’ll really have to look into going fully semiconductor.
“I’ll bring you a bottle,” the voice suggested. He felt a consoling hand pat his forearm. The nurse went into the adjoining washroom and returned with a blue plastic bottle, which she handed to Darian. He looked at it skeptically before pulling it under the covers and positioning himself as best he could. He tried to imagine the nurse wasn’t watching over him so intently, and was soon rewarded with a warm trickle.
Three seconds later, the warm trickle was running down his buttocks and onto the sheet. He tried to re-position the bottle but his body was not responding well, and the trickle continued wherever gravity and his bad aim directed it. He gave up, realizing they were going to have to change the sheets anyway.
He laughed drunkenly at the ridiculousness of his situation—courtesy of the aftereffects of the anesthetics. He was used to being in full control of his body, thoughts, and emotions at all times. All it had taken was one little bullet for him to see how illusory that control had been.
“How are we doing?” the nurse asked.
“Not very well, I’m afraid” he replied, thickly. “I think I’m going to need some fresh sheets.”
The nurse looked only a little exasperated as she took the bottle from him. “Well, that happens,” she said curtly. She ducked out and came back within seconds with fresh linen and some help. Working as a well-coordinated team, the two nurses outfitted him with clean, dry sheets and a new gown. The process wore him out, and he found himself dozing again. Unconsciousness brought relief. Though he managed to keep most of the pain at bay, he still felt an unaccustomed heaviness in his head, and slept.
* * *
“Well, that was a close call, wasn’t it?”
Darian pried his eyes open and looked to see who was disturbing his rest this time.
A middle-aged woman with short, disheveled hair regarded him clinically from beside the bed. A short white lab coat covered her standard hospital-issued green scrubs. “I’m Dr. Stephenson,” she said. “I’m the one who rebuilt your collar bone.” She held out her hand, and Darian shook it weakly.
“Thank you.”
“Luckily, the bullet missed your aorta or you wouldn’t even have made it to the hospital.”
“Luckily,” Darian replied. “If I hadn’t been so distracted by his crazy rant, I might have avoided the shot completely. It put my timing off.”
She regarded him skeptically. “Well done, I guess,” she said. “Let’s have a listen.” She put the cold stethoscope to his chest without bothering to warm it. “Slow breath in. Now, let it out. Good. Again.”
She pulled the stethoscope away, compared the monitor readouts with earlier log entries, and keyed an entry into the clip-pad. “Everything looks good. Well, as good as possible for a man who barely avoided death today. I have to say, this is the first time I’ve ever heard of someone getting shot at a philosophy lecture. You must have said something that really ticked the guy off.”
“It was more of a popular science lecture. And certain types of people are easily upset, I guess,” he answered.
“My apologies. I’d heard it was at a Philosophers Café, and I just assumed.” She spun on one heel and left the room. Darian lay back on his pillow, letting sleep wash over him. The door to his room opened again. Two heads peered around the door. It was Kathy and Greg.
Kathy set a cheery bouquet with a “Get Well Soon” balloon on the nightstand and took Darian’s hand in hers. “Thank God, you’re alright.”
“I don’t think God had anything to do with it,” Darian replied. He looked over at Greg. “Thank you, both of you, for stopping that whack job from getting off another shot. That was either very brave or very foolish, I’m not sure which. But thanks, anyway.”
Greg smiled shyly. “Foolish, I think. The guy didn’t see me at all, even though he was right in front of me. It was a pretty easy tackle. I didn’t even think about it.”
“Well, I wish you would’ve tackled him about two hundred milliseconds later,” said Darian. “I would have been out of the way of the bullet. Your tackle jarred the pistol to his left. The bullet shattered my clavicle.”
Greg scoffed, incredulously. “You mean, instead of going through your heart?” he said. “That’s the thanks I get?”
“No, you’re right,” answered Darian. “I’m sorry. I’m not quite myself yet. The anesthetic is playing havoc with my brain and my lattice can’t seem to get properly synchronized.”
Kathy let go of Darian’s hand. She moved to Greg’s side and took his arm protectively. “You should be grateful. He risked his life for you. We both did.”
“I know,” Darian acknowledged. “Listen, I’m really thankful for what you did. It was courageous, and you probably saved my life. If he’d gotten off a second shot, I might not have been so fortunate. Thanks.”
He looked at Kathy and smiled contritely, “Thanks for launching yourself onto the tackle, too." His eyes moved to where her hand clutched Greg’s bicep. "So are you two together now? Is this something I need to consider when scheduling work?”
“We are,” Kathy said defiantly.
Greg looked surprised and embarrassed but proud, nonetheless. He pulled her closer and put his hand over hers. “We are,” he said. “But it won’t affect our work,” he added hastily. “Our lattices are growing well. There are no signs of complications, and we’ve both noticed slight improvements in our performance this past week.”
Kathy grinned and looked at the floor. Greg blushed. “At work, I mean. Geez, at work! We’ve been finding it a little easier to understand everything. Reading research articles is a snap. I follow the math better now, and Kathy’s engineering work has been progressing well. In fact, she’s almost finished the RAF generator.”
Darian eased himself upright, more interested. “That’s good to hear,” he said. “I don’t know how long they’ll keep me in here. Probably a few days, I imagine.”
“Is that all?” asked Kathy.
“Yeah, their part is done; the recovery work is up to me. My left collarbone was completely smashed in the middle section but they implanted a 3D-printed scaffolding for a new one. It hurts like hell, but it’s probably in better shape than it feels. It’ll take months to fully repopulate with my own bone cells, but these newer scaffolds have q
uite a lot of strength on their own. If I promise to be good, I’m sure they’ll let me out before next weekend, especially if I promise not to give any more public lectures.”
Greg and Kathy grinned. “It will be great to have you back,” she said. “We’ve missed you.”
“Listen,” said Darian. “They have full internet access here. I’ll set up a discussion interface on my live feed page and email you guys the access code. We can keep in touch during the week, in case you have any questions. And maybe we can do a test run as soon as I’m out of here.”
Greg and Kathy nodded and answered at the same time, “Okay.”
“Anyway,” Darian continued, “with no teaching or committee meetings for a while, I might actually get a chance to push the theory a bit further. Maybe even come up with some new ideas for experimental validation.”
Darian looked behind the two of them at the door to his room. “Where’s Larry? Didn’t he come to the hospital with you?”
“I don’t know. Everything happened so fast after you were shot,” answered Greg. “It was pretty chaotic there for a few minutes. I didn’t really see him.”
Darian remembered spotting Larry sitting several rows above the other two. “Is something going on?” he asked. “Does this have anything to do with the two of you having a relationship?”
“No, nothing like that,” said Kathy. “We had a fight over the dendy virus capsule. Greg and I took it; Larry refused. He kinda freaked out a little. We thought it was just a hissy fit, and that it would all blow over by the next day or two. We’d had a few drinks, loose tongues, said some stuff, you know. He was really upset. He said we were crazy, the risks were too high, that he wasn’t having any of it, and stuff like that. He made quite a scene. But leading-edge science is never without its risks.” She looked pointedly at Greg, “And its risk takers, right? Besides, we were pretty sure you wouldn’t give us anything you thought was dangerous.”
“Well, thank you for the vote of confidence. I’m sorry; I didn’t think Larry would object so vehemently to the enhanced-IQ lattice. There are obviously some things I don’t know about him yet.”
“I’ve known him a long time,” said Greg, “and even I didn’t see that coming. For some reason, he suddenly got all cautious with us, like, scared or something. I think he might have some religious-type objections.”
“Religious objections?”
“Well, he doesn’t talk about it much, but Larry was raised Orthodox when he lived in Russia. We’ve had a few deep conversations over the occasional too-many beers. I think he could be a closet believer.”
“Really?” Darian and Kathy both asked at the same time.
Greg smiled, “Well, it is possible that even an astrophysicist could hold a belief in a creator deity. After all, we haven’t proved your hypothesis to be correct yet, you know.”
Darian sighed, suddenly exhausted again. “That’s true,” he said. “But there are many reasons why the idea of an original creator is highly unlikely.”
“Oh, I agree,” said Greg. “And I still think it’ll all blow over, especially after the shooting. I’ll talk to Larry. I’m sure I can convince him it’s safe to take the capsule now that he can see for himself it’s not causing us any problems and it’s already helped us become smart enough to understand most of what you’re trying to teach us. I’m sure he’ll come around.”
“I hope so,” answered Darian. He yawned. “I’m sorry guys, but I think I need to get some sleep. Let’s talk Monday and we’ll see where we’re at.” He gave in and let slumber drag him to empty peace. Greg and Kathy turned off the lights and tip-toed out of the room.
22
In the days following the shooting, Kathy and Greg pushed even harder to complete the RAF generator. Without the benefit of his own intelligence-enhancing dendy lattice, Larry couldn’t keep up with his colleagues. No matter how many hours he pored over their work, his unaided brain couldn’t master the complex mathematical calculations describing the Reality Assertion Field.
In spite of the growing rift between them, Larry didn’t regret his choice to decline the dendy virus.
Greg did try, once, to discuss the virus capsule with him, but Larry shook his head brusquely and rejected the topic with determined finality. Subject closed. Greg saw no point in bringing it up again.
Larry did more than accept his natural limitations, he clung to them. He did his best to make himself useful, carrying out the more mundane lab tasks at Kathy’s direction, while Greg retreated to the office to perform intricate computations on increasingly unusual and complex models.
Between the strains of the deepening divide between them, their intense schedule, and the challenging work, they could barely tolerate one another. Larry held his tongue and steamed inwardly each time Kathy was curt with him. The mutual disdain was nearly constant, most often the result of his trouble comprehending the software and theory.
Larry would have left the team if he hadn’t promised Reverend LaMontagne that he’d keep an eye on their progress and report to Dr. Pratt. He knew his role was vital to the fate of the world, if no longer to the research itself.
He swallowed his pride and sustained every thinly veiled insult from his workmates, along with their more obvious disappointments. He stood back and observed the pair as they drifted further and further into their arcane studies, further and further away from being human in his eyes.
Kathy and Greg held daily update briefings which included Larry, but their rapid back-and-forth jargon made him feel like a toddler who’d wandered into a NASA meeting. Or, more accurately, like a man listening in on a data exchange between two supercomputers.
In the beginning, he’d pestered them to reduce their conclusions to language he could understand. After the first week, he grew tired of their eye rolling and furtively exchanged glances, and he stopped asking. They may have been sympathetic to his emotional struggle but they were on a deadline. Darian was going to be released from the hospital any day now and they wanted to be ready for the first live test.
By the following week, activity in the lab had slowed down as if lulled by the wet, heavy snow falling over Burnaby Mountain campus.
Try as he might, Larry could find no further operational problems with the hardware or software. He followed the protocols Kathy had been painstakingly dictating to him in remedial fashion. He ran the tests, checked the results, and ran them again.
Looking over the latest results, Kathy smiled and stretched back in her chair. “I think we’re ready,” she announced, more to herself than to Larry. She pushed away from the desk and went to find Greg to share the news.
A few minutes later, Greg popped his head into the lab. He looked happy and relaxed, more like the old friend Larry had been missing. “Hey, we’re going out to grab a bite at the Pub. Wanna come along?” Kathy was hanging on his arm.
“Don’t you want to run a live test first?” Larry asked.
Greg laughed, “Do I want Darian to kill us for running the first live test without him? No, thanks. Come out with us. Let’s celebrate.”
Larry considered it for a moment. “No, that’s okay. I think I’ll just keep poking away here. I’m not sure I’ve put the software through all the craziest possibilities imaginable yet.”
A flicker of apprehension crossed Kathy’s face, “Well, okay. You can play all you want but don’t break anything. And do not run a live test.” She tugged Greg away from the door. “Come on, let’s go grab a table before it gets busy.”
Greg stared at Larry for a few seconds. “You’re sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah. You guys have been working really hard and you deserve a break. Take your girl on a lunch date for once. Heck, why don’t you two take off the rest of the afternoon? Go catch a movie or take a stroll around the Seawall. I’ll lock up.”
Greg smiled his appreciation. “That’s a good idea. It’ll feel good to shut down the lattice for a while and experience life as a big ol’ hunk of meat, again,” he laughed. �
��Okay, don’t stay too late. We’ll see you tomorrow. I think Darian will be very pleased.” He put his arm around Kathy’s waist, and the two sashayed down the hallway.
Larry tinkered awhile, running routine tests until he was sure they weren’t turning back. He removed his hands from the keyboard and stretched his arms high above his head. He’d been considering running a live test for a while but wasn’t sure if he was ready.
Darian’s equations predicted the RAF generator would create a microscale universe—a microverse—with its own physical laws. If Darian’s theories were right, nothing should be affected inside the microverse except the speed of light.
Larry didn’t fully understand all the operational parameters that controlled the RAF, but he had practiced with the simulator a lot. He was fairly certain he wouldn’t blow up the real universe by monkeying around with some unreal ones. He hoped not, anyway.
With a deep breath, he pushed his doubts aside, turned on the vacuum chamber pump, waited while the bell jar was emptied of air, and flipped the RAF device to ACTIVE mode. A bluish sphere four centimeters in diameter materialized in the center of the evacuated bell jar.
Larry slapped the switch, killing the ACTIVE mode. He looked around to see if anything had changed. No, everything looked the same.
He passed both hands through his hair and leaned back, pursed his lips, and whistled under his breath. He ran his hands up and down his torso for any signs of…of…he had no idea what he was looking for.
Of course, if I have just changed Reality, the changes might propagate throughout the observable universe. Even my memory of what I look like—or should I say, looked like?—might be different. Who am I to mess with creation? Am I just as evil, just as arrogant, as Darian? Should I just destroy this thing, or is there some way it can be used for good, for the glory of God? Geez, I’m babbling. Babbling like an idiot. Settle down, Larry. Get a grip!—he ordered himself.
Larry wrestled with his conscience until he came to the conclusion that the answers to his flurry of doubts made no difference. He had to proceed with the tests in order to understand the potential of the device. Only then, could he decide how to proceed.