The Leaves in Winter

by M. C. Miller

  Curtis led Noah from the entrance hallway to the back of the house. They entered the expansive family room where on three sides windows looked out over the lake and wilderness beyond.

  Noah stepped to a window. “How much of that out there is yours?”

  “As much as you can see.” Curtis was in no mood to be apologetic about all his life’s labor had gotten him.

  “I guess the helicopter too.”

  Curtis fixed himself a drink. “It belongs to a company I own.”

  Noah turned and stepped around the room inspecting the furnishings. “Why should any one person have so much when so many go without?”

  “As a matter of fact, natural resources are limited but wealth isn’t. There’s no limit to how far the money supply can expand. One simply prints more dollars as new value is added to the marketplace.”

  Noah chuckled. “The marketplace…nothing but a rigged game.”

  “The problem with your way of thinking, you think wealth is a zero-sum pie with only so many pieces to go around. If that were true, then tell me – who had all the collective wealth that exists now a hundred years ago? The truth is, there’s more millionaires today than ever.”

  “And they got that way by exploiting people.”

  “I guess that includes your favorite music groups, sports stars, the princes of social networking, and the purveyors of the inconvenient truth. Wealth is all right in some hands but not others?”

  “Some people don’t have to cheat, steal, and lie to get it.”

  Curtis tired of the expected exchange. “I can hardly argue with someone who is only willing to parrot slogans and sound bites heard at the last rally they attended.”

  “A slogan is more precise and relevant than the same old excuses…”

  “So how much should one have? Where would you draw the line?”

  Noah flopped down on a couch. “Equity.”

  “You mean equally rich or equally poor?”

  “You would put it that way, wouldn’t you.”

  “I’ve thought it through.” Curtis sat at the wet bar. “You see, by the time you are my age there will be nine billion people on the planet requiring equity. I wonder if you’re really prepared to accept the standard of living true equity would entail.”

  “Here we go. The same old scare tactics…”

  Curtis drew a steady gaze on his boy. “As much as it may disappoint, I didn’t ask you to come here to debate macroeconomic theory.”

  “That’s a relief.”

  Curtis downed the rest of his drink. “Yes, well, there’s only so much either of us can bear when it comes to that.”

  “What’s your point? You want to debate family history instead?”

  Determined to get through this, Curtis set his mind on the task at hand.

  “I know we haven’t been close the past few years. It’s obvious you disapprove of my work and lifestyle.”

  Mention of it prompted Noah’s anger. “Yeah, are you still raping a whole province to get rich off oil sands?”

  Curtis snapped back, “And are you still driving a car? Have you been using any one of millions of products produced with oil? Have you even bothered to find out which ones those are? Where’s your commitment to act locally, think globally?”

  “This is a waste of time…”

  Curtis forced composure. “Nonetheless, as much as you might discount it, I care about you. Naturally, I don’t expect you to believe it; not yet. But as a gesture of reconciliation, I’d like to make you an offer.”

  Noah laughed. “What possibly could you offer me that I would want?”

  Curtis stared at Noah until he caught his eye. “How about GenLET?”

  “Oh yeah, like you have GenLET…”

  The disbelieving reaction was kneejerk but insincere. Curtis could see surprise and wonder on Noah’s face even as he shook his head and sniggered.

  “And why not? Because it belongs to NovoSenectus? You already believe I run an evil empire. Why should that stop me? There’s no reason to be surprised.”

  “Next you’re going to say you’ve had the treatment…”

  Curtis could tell the boy was fishing. “What’s the point of having it otherwise?”

  A serious recognition came over Noah. Curtis could see it was sinking in.

  The offer was real. All humor left Noah’s face.

  “Something’s going on. What do you want from me?”

  “I told you. I want you to take the treatment just like I did. I’m offering you extended life.”

  There was a long pause. “Why would you do that?”

  “Your lack of an attention span makes me repeat myself – I care about you.”

  “No shit,” snapped Noah. “Out of the blue you care about me.”

  “A lot of things have gone wrong. That doesn’t mean we can’t make some things right.”

  A rising bitterness showed up in Noah. “You can’t buy me with this.”

  “That’s not my intention. If you want, receive the treatment, go on your way; afterwards, you never have to see me again.”

  “Really, you’d do that for me. How big of you.”

  Curtis refilled his drink. “It’s a one-time offer. No strings attached. Considering the delicacy of the matter, you can see why I needed to present it to you in person.”

  Curtis could see wheels of interest as well as rebellion spinning in Noah’s reaction. For the first time it was hard to tell whether the boy was genuinely attracted to the idea or merely confused how best to refuse in a way to annoy his father.

  Noah got up and stepped to the window.

  “If this is a one-time offer, then everything needs to be worked out between us right now, right?”

  “Yes. There should be no misunderstandings going forward.”

  Noah stared across the distant lake. “So what about my girlfriend? We’re planning on getting married. Can she have GenLET too?”

  The suggestion caught Curtis off-guard. It was either a clever way of negotiating or a test of a father’s resolve. To win his son back, Curtis was willing to bend a long way.

  “I don’t see why not,” answered Curtis. “Naturally, you both would be bound by confidentiality agreements not to tell anyone else about what you received.”

  “Oh, is that the way it works...” Noah glanced back, “And what happens to those who break the agreement?”

  Curtis hedged around what could be a fatal flaw. “There’s no reason to worry about that if you keep it to yourself.”

  Noah nodded and turned back to the view. “I have a couple of best friends; I’ve known them since I was a kid. How about them?”

  Curtis could see where this was going but it was too late. He had opened the door to others and now he was too far into the game to pull back.

  “To a limited extent, some others, close friends could be added.”

  Noah turned to face his father. “But wait a minute. If I’m going to have this extra long life, I’m going to meet all kinds of people. I might get remarried or have a son. I’ll make other friends. I’d want them to have it too. There’s no way I can give you a complete list of people right now. I’d have to be able to pick and choose when the time came. Is that doable?”

  By this point, Curtis was beyond playing the game. He was prepared to promise the boy anything to get him to take the initial treatment.

  “I see your point. I think something can be worked out.”

  “Great! One last thing; no way would I want to do any of this unless Mom was on the list.”

  The look in Noah’s eye told all. The whole thing was a ruse. The boy was playing with him, pushing him, trying to force him to his limit.

  And he had just found it. Curtis set his glass down and prepared for battle.

  “People who waste my time usually regret it.”

  “Oh, yeah? Well, new world elitists like you who think they can hand out life to a select few are going to regret it.”

  “What are you going to do? Firebo
mb me like the man in D.C.?”

  Noah froze, guilt sweeping his face. “What are you talking about?”

  Curtis was livid. “You know damned well what I’m talking about. Washington, D.C. Franklin Park. The lobbyist on K Street.”

  “What do you know about that?”

  “I know you fucked up royally. The federal prosecutor had you and your merry band of NCO assholes lined up for hard time. How stupid can you be?”

  “Why is that any of your business?”

  Curtis yelled, “I made it my business! Like hell was I going to see a son of mine rot in jail for twenty years. You’re not brainless; you’re just too fucking young to know you have brains. You certainly have never been taught how to use them.”

  Noah stood stunned. “You got involved with that? You did something?”

  “Damned right I did something. You needed to be saved from yourself. You have a chance, now don’t screw it up.”

  “I never asked for your help; I didn’t want your help.”

  “Maybe not but you needed it.”

  “Stay out of my business.”

  “Wake up. New Class Order doesn’t care about you.”

  “And neither do you!” shouted Noah. “You think you can bribe me to make nice so you can feel better about yourself. It isn’t going to work.”

  Noah headed for the hallway intent on a return trip helicopter ride.

  The moment was pivotal. Curtis knew if he didn’t somehow stop his son from walking out, he might never be seen again.

  “There’s something else you should know. It’s critically important.”

  Noah halted, expecting only to take a second to be dismissive.

  “That’s just it; we have differing opinions about what’s important.”

  Curtis slid off the bar stool and stepped slowly towards his son.

  “The whole planet is about to change. Billions of people are going to die. Whatever life you and your girlfriend thought you were going to have is over.”

  Stunned into interest, Noah wavered. “What kind of crazy shit is this?”

  “It certainly is crazy but I assure you it’s going to happen. The government won’t tell you; most aren’t aware of the scope of what they’re facing. Those in power don’t want a panic. They’ve made sure that news of this gets sanitized.”

  “News of what?”

  “A plague – one that will decimate populations everywhere. You might have seen the advertisements for it – the recycle symbol…Goodwin Godspeed Diye III.”

  A smile creased Noah’s face. “That shit? That was just some crazy media hoax by some old, eccentric billionaire.”

  “I wish it were…” Curtis was deadly serious. He drew nearer to the boy.

  Attempting to diffuse any hint of peril, Noah clung to denial. “Are you really that desperate? You’re going to try to frighten me into going along with you?”

  “It’s already begun. Tens of thousands are dead in Africa and Asia.”

  “There’s always something like that going on...”

  “Not like this,” Curtis interrupted. “There are people in Bangkok, Hong Kong, Shanghai, all over Asia, starting to stay indoors. They’re worried about rumors they’ve heard. Many people in places like New Delhi and Mumbai have started to wear surgical masks when they go out on the street.”

  “Yeah, so what? Things like that happened with the Swine Flu.”

  Curtis became impassioned. “Just this once listen to me! You want proof? I’ll show you results from one of my biopharma labs. Field researchers got samples from the bodies of early victims. They isolated the pathogen and got a good look at it. The damned thing was engineered to be insidious. No one’s going to stop it.”

  “Engineered?” The key word kept Noah in the room.

  “That’s right. Goodwin Godspeed Diye III. What’s about to happen has been years in the making. It’s not by accident.”

  “Why on Earth would anyone do that?”

  “You said it – Earth. Don’t you want to save the planet – lower CO2, save the whales, stop the destruction of the rainforests? Eugene Mass believed fewer people was the only way.”

  “Mass? That geezer’s dead.” Noah took a step towards the hallway.

  “Thankfully, but I’m afraid his legacy lives on. You need a microscope to see it but it’s more potent and clever than anything the world ever had to contend with.”

  “OK, say this is real. Then what are you doing about it?”

  “There’s only one thing to do. Prepare. Until a vaccine is found, no one’s safe. Like any storm, you’re only as secure as the refuge you take. Mine will be here. Those close to me, if they choose, can ride out the worst of it here on the estate. The chance of infection will be greatly minimized by staying away from population centers.”

  “You expect me to come live here?”

  Curtis arrived at the central reason for the visit. Everything came down to how his son reacted to the final offer.

  “Yes. I’m pleading with you to do just that. Bring your girlfriend if you want. I won’t get in the way. As you see the place is big enough we can avoid each other.”

  Noah shook his head, laughed, and looked at the floor.

  “Wow. You’re fucking serious.”

  “I know, it’s a lot to absorb. You don’t have to answer right now. Take your time. You may think there’s no reason to trust me but trust your gut. This is critical.”

  Noah held a hand to his forehead and avoided eye contact.

  “I don’t know. I can’t do this right now. I’m going to take a look around.”

  Unsure of his own feelings, Noah fled the room.

  Curtis let him go. The boy hadn’t asked for a return flight home and for now that was progress enough. Maybe at least he’d consider the offer. It was all Curtis could hope for. But it left him feeling drained. Having everything finally out between the two of them gave no sense of relief. So much that was vital remained unsettled.

  Curtis returned to the wet bar but thought better of having another drink. His phone rang. He answered it while strolling to the window. A top researcher was on the line with a daily status report.

  Curtis was in no mood for long-winded explanations.

  “Never mind all that; what’s the bottom line?”

  The researcher shifted gears and responded as abruptly.

  “There’s no evidence of GenLET or a 3rd Protocol vaccine in the subject DNA. We’ve run every possible test from the eggs you sent us. Except for a few variations that don’t apply, what we found matches any normal, untreated person.”

  Curtis paced. “I can’t believe there’s nothing else to try…”

  “Maybe if we had more eggs. We’re limited by what little embryonic stem cell production is possible. Can you get us more eggs?”

  “The research center in Puerto Rico is wrapped tight. You’ll have to find some other way to keep working. You must keep at it.”

  “But like I said, we’ve reached the point where there’s nothing else to find.”

  “Somehow I find that incongruous with being a researcher. There has to be.”

  “If you want, we can redo tests or ask around, possibly think of new ones – but all that does is bring us back to the eggs. Without more eggs, there’s no way to test.”

  Curtis halted. “That means GARC is the key.”

  “That’s what I’m saying.”

  “All right. I’ll see what I can do. In the meantime, double-check what you have. What we’ve started we have to finish.”

  The call ended. Out in the hallway, hidden around a wall, Noah stood listening. He had only heard one side of the conversation but it was enough to solidify his resolve. He didn’t trust his father, now more than ever, but he’d stay and see what else he could learn. So far he knew GARC was the key.

  Curtis’s last words echoed back. “…what we’ve started we have to finish.”

  Those were Noah’s sentiments exactly.

  Chapter 47

 
; Two Weeks Later

  Sub-Basement Conference Room, GARC

  The room’s silence matched its starkness. Small spotlights highlighted the table’s blank surface as if nothing beyond the narrow halos of brightness mattered. Empty chairs hugged the table’s perimeter. A whiteboard stood by blank and in shadow. There was room for twenty at the conference table.

  Janis and Faye walked in to find only one.

  Colin Insworth sat relaxed, leaning back, ignoring the tablet computer before him. An active screensaver gave measure of how long he’d been quiet, still, and lost in thought. His eyes flicked focus from a vanishing point across the room to watch the women walk in and take a seat.

  “Thank you for coming,” he began, a marked gravitas all too apparent. He glanced at Janis. “I realize after a long day this is the last thing you want to do, but bear with me. I have news both of you should hear together. It’s from Granite Peak.”

  Neither Janis nor Faye reacted openly but they’d been expecting to hear test results of their trial sterility fix for days. If anything, such news was overdue. The first trial was their best effort so far to find a way to reverse sterility. Preventing it from happening in utero was to be their next project. To be able to move forward and develop trial two, they needed positive results on their work so far.

  Colin’s relaxed posture belied the severity of the news. “They had no success.”

  For a moment, the certainty of it smothered every sound and hope in the room.

  Colin added, “They ran every test you suggested and a few of their own.”

  Deflated, Faye quizzed, “They saw nothing? No change?”

  “No, none that meant anything. They tried variations, noted some effects on secondary characteristics but nothing that reversed sterility.”

  Janis prompted, “Don’t hold back on the data. We need to review exactly what they did. Something might have gotten overlooked.”

  “You’ll have the data on the servers within the hour. But they’re confident with the results. Nothing was overlooked.”

  Janis’ frustration edged into defensiveness. “If it was overlooked, I hardly think they’d know it. That’s just the point.”