The God Organ

by Anthony J Melchiorri

  She would have to accept what he told her.

  Only Doug came to greet him when he entered the apartment. The dog’s tail wagged sleepily and his tongue slobbered wildly across Matthew’s hand.

  “Good boy.” He patted Doug’s head. “Let’s not wake Mommy.”

  He padded quietly over the hardwood floor. Slipping off his slacks and unbuttoning his shirt, he threw them over a chair in the corner of the bedroom. Doug slumped down next to the chair, and the moonlight filtering in through the window revealed an empty bed. Matthew exhaled.

  He slipped between the covers of the bed. Muddled thoughts haunted him, preventing him from falling asleep. He wished he was still next to Jacqueline, but the more he thought of Audrey and her bright green eyes and freckled nose, the less desire he had to tear himself away from his marriage.

  On top of his personal troubles, he couldn’t rid himself of the LyfeGen fiasco. Jacqueline might be right. There could very well be another group looking to sabotage the company and, as a result, his livelihood, his identity. Everything he had worked for rested on LyfeGen’s success. He hadn’t come this far only to lose his job because some nut job harbored a vendetta against the company. His company.

  Jacqueline was right. They needed Audrey. His company needed her. He needed her. Things would have to change between him and her. He needed to fix this.

  Sleep finally took hold of him, plunging him into restless dreams. A rustling of the covers woke him, but he didn’t need to open his eyes to tell it was still dark. He wrapped an arm around his wife, felt a gentle kiss on his skin, and floated back to sleep.

  Chapter 20

  Preston Carter

  November 14, 2063

  Erik flipped a pancake. He placed it on a slowly growing stack as Preston came into the kitchen. Preston hugged him and took a deep sniff of the cinnamon-and-spice scent emanating from the pancakes.

  “This is a nice surprise. Thanks.”

  “Of course.” Erik smiled, pouring more batter. “I know how you love your pumpkin pie pancakes.”

  “That I do. Thanks for everything.”

  “I thought it would be nice to get up early and actually join you for breakfast for once.”

  “I mean, thanks for everything. Not just breakfast. Since Joel died, you’ve been great to me, you know? Picked up the slack at home with Kyle as I’ve been struggling with the whole CEO business.”

  Erik deposited another pancake on the stack. “How’s it going at work?”

  “Stressful. And it’s difficult to pretend it’s not stressful when I’m working with everyone there, which makes it even more stressful. I’m not used to dealing with finances, marketing, publicity, and all that. It’s been a steep learning curve.”

  “I can tell. I’ve been counting the increasing number of gray hairs on your head.”

  Preston laughed, knowing that despite his stress, there would be no gray hairs. The Sustain ensured that his hair follicles remained healthy and his hair was as deep brown as it had been when he was twenty.

  His smile constricted when he gave his Sustain a second thought. All these issues with people dying of strokes had him increasingly worried about the company’s wellbeing. He had been so concerned about LyfeGen that he had neglected the distinct possibility that he or Erik could easily be the next victim of whatever plagued the Sustain.

  “What’s wrong?” Erik asked.

  “Just thinking about work. I’ve got a couple of dilemmas that have been bothering me.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “All right, but it goes without saying that you can’t repeat any of this information.”

  “You know you can trust me. And if this is going to be a serious discussion, we can’t let breakfast get cold.” Erik scooped up a couple of pancakes for each of them.

  “Here goes. You know about Joel’s death. And you’ve seen the stories about the other three deaths of people who had Sustains. A couple employees and a lawyer who once worked with the company, right? And now Jonathan. You met him at a couple of work functions. You know, the guy with that lumberjack beard?”

  “Yes,” Erik said. “Poor guy, but what an atrocious beard.”

  Preston couldn’t help smiling. “Right. Anyway, you know they all had Sustains.”

  “So far, you haven’t told me anything I couldn’t have already gotten from the news.”

  “I know, I know,” Preston said. “Let me get to the point. The Board wants me to skew the reports and make it seem as if there’s no problem with the Sustain. They want us to report to the FDA that it was the doctors’ fault.”

  “What? That’s outrageous.”

  “It wouldn’t be difficult. Amongst these victims, there are only two doctors who performed the surgeries and the follow-ups.”

  Erik frowned. “You aren’t seriously considering reporting that?”

  “If I don’t, LyfeGen could very well go underwater.”

  “You’re telling me you want to lie to the FDA, lie to the patients, and pretend there’s no problem at LyfeGen? You want to blame these innocent doctors?”

  “I don’t want to. But the Board seems pretty convinced that this is the right way to go.”

  “Preston,” Erik said, his voice stern and serious. “I know you better than that. You’re not the backstabbing, lying, cheating kind of guy. You’re better than that. You’ve always been better than that.”

  “I know, but there’s a good chance I could lose my job.” Preston knew his response sounded lame. He wanted to believe the Board could be right. Maybe the doctors did have something to do with it. But he couldn’t make an assertion like that without evidence.

  He did know one thing: good science should be based on good evidence. He would never say a product was ready for implantation without thorough testing, and he couldn’t support a hypothesis about doctors screwing up Sustains without evidential support.

  “Would that be such a bad thing? Look at what they’re asking you to do. I know you better than that.” Erik took hold of Preston’s hand. “The man I married wouldn’t consider doing something like that for a second.”

  Preston sighed and closed his eyes. Knowing the ramifications of the decisions he would have to make, he nodded.

  ***

  When he arrived at his office, Preston set his windows to one hundred percent clarity. He didn’t want simulated blinds or fractional opacity settings or some tinted hue coloring his world. Instead, he bathed his office in pure, natural light.

  The warmth of his office begged him to fall back asleep. He needed every bright ray of sunlight to keep his eyes open. Even caffeine couldn’t cut it lately.

  He turned on his computer and an array of projected papers and messages flooded his desk. It had taken him about a week to set up an automatic filtering system to send his messages to the appropriate virtual folders and shelves he’d constructed. While many of his employees adopted more intuitive filing systems and document interfaces, he preferred that his virtual papers and files appear more like physical documents. That was more intuitive to him. He could eliminate the learning curve while utilizing current technology.

  The aroma of evergreen trees overtook the room when Anil knocked and opened the door to greet him.

  “God,” Preston said. “Any chance maintenance is going to fix those scentsors today? I love trees as much as the next guy, but they’ve got to fix the volume issues with those smells.”

  “At least you can escape it,” Anil said. “There’s a scentsor placed directly above my office door and the smell just wafts right in, even if I close the door. I’ve got half a mind to go use Joel’s old office.”

  “You do know Joel had a scentsor in his office?”

  “Ack.” Anil stuck out his tongue. “That simply will not do.” He sat down across from Preston.

  “So what’s going on?”

  Anil grinned like the Cheshire Cat. That expression always unnerved Preston and he presumed it was yet another reason he preferred spending
as little time with the man as possible, despite Anil’s usefulness. “You told me you wanted me to be your ears in the corridors.”

  Preston nodded, motioning for Anil to continue.

  “I harbor the belief that employee trust in the CEO is vital to a company’s success. It directly impacts morale and productivity, from what I can tell.” Anil maintained that repugnant smirk. “And we wouldn’t want people to question company leadership in a particularly nasty bit of history for us. It’s best we know what the underlings have to say so we can better address the matter.”

  “Fine,” Preston said. “But I’d appreciate it if you sounded less scheming.”

  “Shall I be upfront and brutally honest?”

  Preston fought the urge to roll his eyes. Anil undoubtedly enjoyed the self-imparted sense of importance and power he took from serving as a network for company information, both in significant business issues and catty personal matters. “Go on.”

  “Remember, they’re not my words. I’m merely relaying what I heard. Apparently, there are a few repulsive accusations in circulation saying that you reached your position through rather unconventional means. Rumor has it that you and Joel Cobb shared more than a traditional working partnership.”

  Preston frowned.

  “Like I said, most repulsive. Would you like me to detail some of the claims?”

  “No.” Preston said. “This is old news. Who’s bringing this garbage up again?”

  “Are you sure you really want to know? Who can be sure who really started such a vile rumor and who is merely parroting the information, anyway? We’ve all repeated some juicy morsel in the vain pursuit of popularity. So your opinion may be colored in a manner that isn’t productive to work around the office. I know the curiosity must be eating at you, but the woman I heard it from is just part of a long history of lurid accusations.”

  “A woman? It’s not Meredith? It better not be Meredith.” Preston scowled. He hated teasing information out of Anil and thought it might be better to ignore the matter. Maybe he’d already appeared too concerned with public appearances, too eager to get wrapped up in Anil’s gossip mill.

  Anil just laughed. “No. You’re right to accuse her of being jealous, but she’s fairly innocuous. Her temper has been extending to more than just you, and I don’t think too many people see her as a welcome listener.”

  “Let me think about this,” Preston said. “I’m not going to let these ridiculous claims affect our progress. Do you have anything more significant to report on our production and orders?”

  “Expectedly, Sustain orders have dropped by another five percent. I believe that trend will continue until the FDA clears us for continued production—assuming that’s the case.”

  “Of course it will be the case.”

  “You may want to reiterate that to the Board,” Anil said. “You’re not the only one relying on me to keep my ears open.” The Cheshire Cat grin spread across his face again.

  The full meaning of Anil’s insinuation made Preston weak and nervous. The mere idea that the Board was trying to operate behind his back made him fearful of what might be driving them to do so. And he had decided he wouldn’t acquiesce to their baseless finger-pointing at doctors who might have had nothing to do with the Sustain failures. His career prognosis didn’t appear promising.

  Chapter 21

  Preston Carter

  November 19, 2063

  The unmistakable smell of sterility wafted around Preston as he sat in an examination room in Dr. Hassan’s office. Dr. Hassan specialized in cellular and genetic therapies. He was a pioneer in his field and had risked his career to champion a volatile field at its clinical inception. While genetic therapies had existed for some years, applied only in dire circumstances or relegated to laboratory experiments, he had volunteered to host a smattering of clinical studies. LyfeGen’s earliest Sustain trial was just one of the many studies listed in the doctor’s curriculum vitae.

  “Roll up your sleeve,” Dr. Hassan said as he waddled in from the hallway.

  Preston draped his suit jacket over the back of the chair, then rolled up his sleeve. By now, he knew exactly into which blue vein Hassan would inject the one milliliter of solution containing millions of submicroscopic custom genetic vectors.

  Although Preston was accustomed to the injections, his chest tightened. He stared at his arm and back at the vial in Hassan’s hand.

  “We going to do this or not, Mr. Carter?”

  “Sorry.” Preston snapped back to reality.

  Hassan inserted the needle into the vial and pulled back the plunger. The liquid swirled up into the disposable syringe. He tapped on it, coaxing the small bubbles to rise back up toward the raised needle. After he evacuated the remaining air, he frowned at Preston’s forearm. “Damn. Forgot the rub-down.”

  The doctor dabbed at Preston’s skin with a cotton swab soaked in rubbing alcohol.

  A pit formed in Preston’s stomach. He thought about how confident he’d been when he first underwent his Sustain implantation. He remembered Joel personally attending the surgery, ecstatic to see a close coworker and friend adopting his newly developed technology.

  Joel was dead, though. He couldn’t be saved by his own invention.

  No. Maybe he’d died because of his invention. Maybe he’d died because there was something wrong. The qualms of wrongdoing, of a possible saboteur infiltrating LyfeGen, reignited his suspicion.

  “Stop.” Preston rolled his sleeve back down.

  Hassan scowled. “What?”

  “I’m not getting the update.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m not getting it. I can’t.”

  “I don’t understand,” Hassan said. “You set up the appointment, you get the shot.”

  “No, not today. Can you put it back in the bottle?”

  “I’m supposed to put it in your arm. This makes no sense. Please, let’s just get this over with, Mr. Carter.”

  “No. I’m asking you to put it back in the bottle. I’m taking it with me.”

  “You’re taking the bottle with you? That won’t work. That’s illegal—to give a patient genetic therapies like this.”

  “I run the company that makes that therapy. I need that bottle with its contents intact.”

  “Why? Do you not trust me?”

  “It has nothing to do with you.” Frustration shook Preston’s voice. “Don’t ask any more questions. I don’t care if you need to mark it down in my medical records that you delivered. I’ll pay in full. But I need that bottle with everything in it.”

  Hassan stood frozen, wrinkles in his knitted brow.

  “Please. Just do this for me. I promise I’m not going to report you. If I did something like that, don’t you think I’d be in more legal trouble than you? What do you think people would think if they found out I didn’t take my own product as prescribed?”

  “Fine,” Hassan said. “But I’ll sue you if you throw me under the bus.”

  “I’m not going to throw you under the bus,” Preston said.

  He took the small glass bottle and held the vial up to examine the liquid sloshing around the bottom.

  “Thank you.” He put on his suit jacket and slid his comm card on the auto-receptionist receiver at the room’s door. “See? Paid in full.”

  Preston’s thoughts raced during his drive back to the office, contemplating the consequences of his rash decision. He clung to the hope that Hassan wouldn’t break his trust. But it wasn’t the doctor that Preston truly feared.

  ***

  “Shaw and Crane are already waiting for you.” Anil smiled his smug, toothy grin. “It’s been quite the day at the office and I’m certainly glad you’re back in the driver’s seat. I swear, Shaw could scold a baby until it cried, without a bit of guilt. In fact, I’m sure he’d enjoy the sport.”

  Preston nodded and slunk back into his office. A new painting that Erik had given him caught his eye. The art depicted a craggy coastline full of p
ointed rocks that jutted upward into a warm blue sky. Crashing waves broke against the jagged fingers of rock. Atop it all, a white, scarlet-striped classic 1800s lighthouse stood proudly.

  Erik had told Preston that he needed the lighthouse right now. It was a symbol of both the troubles he faced and his strength to withstand those troubles, to guide himself and LyfeGen.

  Preston slumped into the chair at the head of the conference table. With a flick of his finger, he dialed in Shaw and Crane.

  Jason Shaw’s hologram fizzled into place first. As always, his expression was stern. His somber black suit and plain black tie appeared more appropriate for a funeral than a business meeting.

  Vernon Crane appeared, seated with his back slightly hunched. He wore his usual sympathetic expression, giving no indication of whether the Board was disappointed, satisfied, or out to destroy the entire company.

  “David will be joining us shortly,” Shaw said. “No use wasting our time with small talk until then.”

  The three men sat in silence.

  “Sorry I’m late,” David Gifford said, his image appearing in the empty conference seat across from Crane.

  “We’ve got several items on the agenda that we need to discuss,” Shaw said. “First of all, it seems that the media firestorm has weakened. People have gotten bored with a story that hasn’t gone anywhere. That might sound good, but I’m not satisfied with that.”

  “Yes.” Crane nodded slowly. “We need to know that progress is being made. Even more important, we need the public to know that there is progress in resolving this unfortunate calamity.”

  “I understand,” Preston said. “It’s about time I made a public appearance, given I haven’t held a press conference since we first announced Cobb’s death.”

  “I’m not sure that’s our answer,” Gifford said.

  “It wouldn’t hurt,” Preston said.

  He didn’t like the look that passed between Gifford and Shaw.

  Preston continued. “Do you have another solution? I’ve been working with Anil to leak positive stories of our research into the news streams. In addition, we’ve had some real breakthroughs in the R&D department that will—I can say this in full confidence—revolutionize the Sustain update delivery system. That all will be very promising in the long-term future.”