by Andrew Lane
‘Are you going to come back some time?’ Tara asked.
He nodded. ‘I will,’ he said. ‘I promise.’
‘Chinese next time?’
He smiled. ‘Sounds good.’
Tara got up too, and stepped forward towards Tom. He tensed slightly, but she slid her arms round his waist and pressed her head against his chest. ‘Thanks for visiting,’ she said, her voice muffled by his shirt. ‘And thanks for the food.’
He didn’t seem to know what to do, so he just stood there while she hugged him. Eventually she let go and stepped away, hands behind her back. He smiled uncertainly at her, and walked towards the door.
‘It will be OK,’ he said, opening it and turning to look at her. ‘I know it will.’
‘I wish I could be sure of that,’ she replied.
He left, closing the door behind him. She heard the bolt slide into place.
She stood there for a few moments, feeling the rectangular shape of Tom’s mobile phone in her hand. He hadn’t noticed her slip it out of his pocket. If she was lucky, she might have it for an hour or two, and that would be more than enough time to call for help.
She smiled for the first time in days. He was an idiot. All boys were idiots.
‘Calum?’
Calum turned over and stared at the open door. He had already known that there was someone there, by the sound of the door opening, but he hadn’t wanted to acknowledge them. Instantly reacting any time the door opened, like a puppy hearing the rattle of a packet of biscuits, wasn’t cool. He wanted them to wait on him, not the other way round.
It was a minor psychological victory, but it was a victory.
Dr Kircher was standing in the rectangle of freedom revealed by the open door. ‘Calum? I have someone here who wants to talk to you.’
‘And if I don’t want to talk?’
Dr Kircher smiled a thin smile. The glow from the overhead fluorescent tubes reflected from his glasses, turning them into flat sheets of light. ‘Oh, I wouldn’t be uncooperative if I were you. We all want the same thing here.’
‘And what is that?’
‘You up and about on your own two feet, of course.’
‘And, speaking of that, is there any progress on finding out what happened back in my apartment?’ Calum asked. ‘Only, I can’t help but notice that, apart from a rather crude psychological evaluation, I’ve not been involved with any tests or anything.’
‘We’re still going through the data from the processor on the bionic legs and from the ARLENE robot,’ Kircher said. ‘Once we have done that, we can move towards looking at what’s best for you. He frowned slightly. ‘I have to say that the data from the robot is very inconclusive. It almost looks as if it’s been edited – there’s no information in there about where it has been used. But, anyway, our initial hypothesis – that the robot reacted to stray electromagnetic signals from the processor on the legs – appears to be false. The robot seems to have been operating under the influence of a separate signal from outside. It’s all very puzzling.’
Someone coughed in the corridor. Kircher straightened up slightly – not quite coming to attention, but not far short.
‘Yes, of course,’ he said. ‘Calum, this is Mr Pournell. He’s here from . . . our head office.’
Kircher moved backwards, and another man stepped forward to take his place. He was wearing a dark suit, a white shirt and a blue tie with red stripes. His hair was black, and swept straight back off his forehead. He was probably in his mid-forties, Calum estimated. A slight waft of expensive aftershave came with him.
‘Hi,’ Calum said, beating him to the punch.
‘Hi,’ the man said brightly, entering the room. Kircher moved to follow him, but Pournell shut the door in Kircher’s face. ‘Calum. Can I call you Calum? You can call me Dave.’
‘So, Dave,’ Calum said, ‘when can I leave?’
Pournell’s expression didn’t change from the bright smile that almost seemed to have been painted on, but his next words sent a chill down Calum’s back. ‘Why, you can walk out of here any time you want, kid.’
‘Very funny.’
‘Sorry – you’re right, that was in poor taste. But my intent was serious – do you want to walk out of here?’
‘Once those bionic legs are fixed, I fully intend to. And I’m going to walk into the British embassy and put in a strongly worded complaint about having been brought here against my will and locked up in this room for reasons that are still a mystery to me.’
Pournell frowned in an exaggeratedly theatrical manner. He turned to the door, slid his fingertips in between the door and the frame and pulled the door partially open. Dr Kircher’s face was momentarily visible in the gap. Pournell let the door hiss shut again. ‘No locks there,’ he said. ‘Looks as if you could get out whenever you want.’ He looked around. ‘Actually, that is a point. We should provide a wheelchair for you. Nothing fancy, I’m afraid. Not motorized. Very basic. But if you want to leave, you can. We’ll even call a cab for you to the airport.’
Calum knew that the door had opened so smoothly because he’d taped the tongue of the lock down last night, and he suspected that Pournell did too. ‘And will you fly me back home?’ he asked.
‘Ah, I’m sorry: the corporate jet is being used elsewhere, but I’m sure you can afford a ticket. I recommend the seats by the emergency doors – there’s more leg room.’
‘You’re from Nemor Incorporated,’ Calum said quietly.
‘That I am. Good work, Calum – you’re as intelligent as your reputation suggests, and that means you’ll listen to the proposal I have to make and react to it in an intelligent manner.’
Here it is, Calum thought, the reason for this visit, and probably the reason I’m here in America in the first place. ‘What’s your proposal, Dave?’
Pournell walked forward and stopped just in front of the foot of Calum’s bed. ‘How would you like to properly walk again? Not just with the bionic legs – we both know that’s a poor substitute for the real thing – but how would you like to actually be able to control your legs, and feel things touching them again?’
‘You know I would,’ Calum said darkly.
‘Of course. Who wouldn’t?’ He paused. ‘We can make that happen.’
Calum let the silence run on for a few moments. He wasn’t sure what to say, how to react – even what to think.
‘How?’ he said eventually.
‘You’ve heard about stem cells, haven’t you?’
‘Stem cells are cells that haven’t decided what they want to grow up to be yet.’
Pournell nodded. ‘Slightly simplistic, but basically accurate. Good enough for me, anyway – I’m a businessman, not a scientist. Well, we’ve made some significant strides in stem-cell research in the past year or two. We now have the ability to inject stem cells into the site of an injury – a spinal injury, to take a random example – and then persuade the stem cells to repair the nerve damage by using appropriate triggering drugs. It’s an experimental treatment at the moment, but we’re working up to small-scale trials and we’re looking for volunteers. Volunteers with crippling spinal injuries and a strong desire to walk again.’ He paused. ‘Do you know anyone like that, Calum?’
‘And what do I have to do to qualify for the experimental trials?’ Calum asked. His heart was racing, and he could hardly breathe. To suddenly be given the chance to walk again . . . it was incredible. And scary – especially considering where the offer was coming from. ‘What do you want in return?’
‘Something very simple. Something so simple that you wouldn’t even miss it.’
‘Name it.’
‘The genetic samples from the Almasti that your friends brought back from Georgia.’
‘The expedition was a bust,’ Calum said calmly. ‘They never found the Almasti. It’s just a legend, like the Yeti, or the Sasquatch.’
‘Please,’ Pournell said, ‘don’t insult my intelligence. My people did enough background interview
s to know that something was being covered up by the villagers you met. We know you found the Almasti, even though you managed to send our team in the wrong direction. Anyway, rather than keep looking out there ourselves, searching all the valleys in the Caucasus Mountains until we hit the right one, it’s more cost-effective to get the samples from you.’
‘If there are any samples.’
‘Let’s assume, for the purposes of conversation, that there are.’
‘And what will you do with them?’
‘The same as you would have done – sequence the genes, work out what each of them does, see if there are any genes that we don’t already see in nature, splice them into living tissue and see if we can replicate their effects.’ His face took on an earnest expression. ‘Just think about it, Calum – you could help us cure cancer, or malaria, or any of a hundred different diseases.’
‘And you would charge for the cures,’ Calum pointed out, feeling anger raging beneath his calm surface. This was a replay of the argument he’d had with Gillian Livingstone a few days ago. ‘You would make a profit from curing suffering – and if people couldn’t pay then you wouldn’t cure them.’
‘It takes billions of pounds to fully investigate a new genome and test the genes,’ Pournell pointed out, ‘and that money has to come from somewhere. Universities and charities just don’t have the resources. You know that already – you just don’t want to admit it. We’re the only ones who have the resources to do the job – and, yes, why shouldn’t we be rewarded for putting all that money into it?’
‘You tried to hack into my website, using Tara Fitzgerald,’ Calum pointed out, shifting the argument sideways. ‘You kidnapped Natalie Livingstone and tried to get to the Almasti before we did. Why should I trust you?’
Pournell smiled. ‘Industrial espionage is everywhere, Calum. What – you haven’t tried to investigate our website, find out more about us? I can’t say I blame you. I would have done the same thing in your position – but don’t try to pretend that you are somehow better than us.’
‘I haven’t kidnapped anyone,’ Calum pointed out.
‘Give it time,’ Pournell replied. ‘If you find a good enough reason, you’ll do it.’ He sighed, and shook his head. ‘Look, kid, I don’t want to get into a philosophical argument with you, I really don’t. The offer is on the table. Think about it. Give us the Almasti genetic material and we’ll give you functioning legs again. It’s a bargain, whichever way you look at it. I’ll come back tomorrow, and hopefully by then you’ll see your way clear to giving us what we want.’ He turned to go, and then casually turned back again. ‘Oh, by the way – Dr Kircher said that one of their diagnostic computer tablets has gone missing. I don’t suppose anyone left it in here, did they?’
Pournell stared at Calum, and Calum could see despite his perfectly bland expression that the Nemor Inc. representative knew perfectly well that Calum had the tablet. He frowned for a moment, pretending to think, then reached down and took it from the side of his bed, where he had stowed it beside the mattress. ‘Oh, yes, Dr Laurence left it here yesterday. I meant to tell someone, but I forgot.’
Calum held out the tablet, and Pournell reached out and took it. He stared at it for a moment, and then looked back at Calum.
‘Thanks, kid. I’ll have a word with Dr Laurence. He really shouldn’t leave these things lying around.’
He pulled open the door, then turned to glance back at Calum. ‘Did you know you talk in your sleep?’ he asked casually. ‘Well, if you’re sedated, anyway. You had a lot to say about Hong Kong, and a cryptid that your little friends are looking for. It was so interesting that I decided to put together a little team of my own to find it. Much better equipped than your friends, and much more . . . professional. I’ll let you know how it all pans out.’ He walked into the corridor, pausing only to reach down and tear off the strip of adhesive plastic that Calum had stuck across the lock. ‘Messy,’ he said quietly. ‘I do so hate it when things get stuck over walls and doors. I much prefer a clean working environment.’ He left, and the door shut behind him. Calum very distinctly heard the click as the tongue of the lock engaged with the hole in the door frame. He was locked in again.
He waited for a few moments, until he was sure that Pournell wasn’t going to come back, then he reached down and reassuringly felt the edge of the second tablet computer that he had taken. He had slid that under the mattress so that it would be harder to find.
He didn’t mind losing one tablet – in fact, he had almost expected it. He still had the second left, and he intended to keep on using it.
Calum had a dilemma now, and he wasn’t sure what to do. His dream ever since the accident had been to get back the ability to walk, but he had assumed that it would take a lot of time and a lot of work. Now he was being handed the solution on a plate, and all he had to do was give up on his moral position with regard to the Almasti genetic material.
Which was, he thought, what it must be like being offered eternal life by the Devil, at the small cost of your soul.
CHAPTER thirteen
It was next morning, some indeterminate time between breakfast and lunch, that Dave Pournell came back to visit Calum.
The tablet computer was hidden beneath Calum’s mattress. He had already realized that daytime was the riskiest time for using it. Instead he just sat there quietly in bed, apparently staring at the wall but in reality working through in his head all the possible permutations of what might be happening to his friends, in England and in Hong Kong.
Pournell stood in the doorway. He was still neatly dressed in suit and tie. He checked the edge of the door to see whether Calum had ‘fixed’ it again, and then grinned at Calum as he entered the room.
‘Hey, kid, how’s things?’
‘What can I say?’ Calum responded with a shrug.
‘The standard phrase is “Same old, same old”,’ Dave said. ‘But, just to save you the trouble, let me say that I know what you’re going to say – you’ve been kidnapped, you can’t communicate with anybody, you want to get out of here and go back home, blah, blah, blah. Am I right?’
‘Pretty much,’ Calum admitted. ‘I was going to complain about the lack of entertainment as well. Would it kill you guys to put cable TV in these rooms?’
Pournell laughed. ‘I like your spirit, Calum, I really do.’ He walked to the end of Calum’s bed and put his hands on the rails. ‘It’s crunch time, kid. I offered you a bargain, last time I was here. Now I need your answer. It’s a very simple choice: you can walk again, or you can keep the Almasti DNA to yourself.’
Calum was silent for a few moments, staring at Pournell’s smiling face. He had been mulling the choice over for hours, and it all came down to a very basic question – was he searching for cryptids so he could use their DNA to help cure a whole load of people of a whole load of diseases, as he had told Gillian Livingstone, or was he in it just to cure himself and damn the rest. If it was the former, then he had to keep the Almasti DNA to himself until he could get it into the hands of a laboratory that would sequence it for free and distribute it widely. If it was the latter, then he might as well give the DNA to Nemor Inc. in return for them treating him with their stem-cell technology – if it existed and if it worked as well as they said it did. Was he as altruistic as he liked to think in his better moments, or as selfish as he believed himself to be in his darker moments? What kind of person was he?
‘Can’t do it, Dave,’ he said, surprising himself. He hadn’t meant to say anything, not that quickly anyway, but it seemed as if his subconscious mind had already decided for him. He was a better person than he had feared.
Pournell looked disappointed. ‘You sure? You’re throwing away a lot.’
‘I’m sure.’
‘I wish I could say I respected your principles, but I don’t. I just think you’re being stupid.’
Calum shrugged. ‘What can I say? Look, there’s no point in you keeping me here any more. You’ve tried your best, but
I haven’t played ball. Take me back home, and we’ll call it quits. I won’t make any trouble over the kidnapping. If you can’t take me home, at least take me to an airport, and I’ll find my own way back.’
Pournell stared at him for a few long seconds, and Calum realized as he watched the man that his smile was just a muscular reaction. It didn’t mean anything. He wasn’t happy, cheerful, friendly, or anything else that a smile might indicate. He was a deeply dangerous man, behind that mask.
‘You know, let’s not do that,’ he said. ‘Let’s go to plan B instead.’
‘Plan B?’ Calum asked, feeling his spirits drop.
‘Yeah.’ Without turning his head, Pournell called, ‘Hey, Kircher, get in here!’
Dr Kircher hurried through the door. ‘Yes, sir, what is it?’
‘You were telling me earlier about some conclusions you’d come to about that mental link to the bionic legs.’
‘Yes, that’s right.’ Kircher sounded as if he was reading from a script. ‘I think that the problem with the stray signals affecting the ARLENE robot can be solved by reducing the wireless signal strength.’
‘Great!’ Pournell said. ‘And how do you go about doing that?’
‘Well,’ Kircher went on, ‘having the sensors on Calum’s scalp gives us a level of signal blockage that has to be overcome by high sensitivity. If we can actually implant the sensors in Calum’s brain, then we can reduce the sensitivity by a factor of a hundred or so.’
‘Wonderful! So brain surgery is the answer. Let’s start preparing the operating theatre!’
Kircher looked uncomfortable, but all he said was, ‘Yes, sir!’ He turned to leave, and didn’t even look at Calum as he went.
‘For the record,’ Calum said in a shaky voice, ‘I don’t want brain surgery.’
‘Nonsense. You want this problem fixed, don’t you?’
‘Not this way!’
‘Unfortunately, that release document you signed – you really should have read the small print – it gives Dr Kircher carte blanche to do anything he needs in order to get those bionic legs working, up to and including radical surgery. Of course, there is a risk of possible side effects, including brain damage, coma and death, but then any serious surgery carries risks. I’m sure you understand.’