Embryo 2: Crosshairs

by JA Schneider

  David said, “Aw, lemme hold him.” She handed the blue-blanketed bundle to him and he cradled the infant, used his free right hand to pat the baby’s wisps of light brown hair.

  Jill watched, feeling bereft, feeling Jesse’s warmth leave her arms. It was always a wrench, separating from him.

  A second Texas neonatologist said, “But he isn’t waving and responding now. He’s mostly sleeping like any newborn.”

  “His hemoglobin’s adjusting,” David said, and the London pediatric hematologist nodded eagerly. He wore a flowered tie, Nike running shoes, and was younger than the Texas trio.

  “Before birth,” he said in his elegant British tones, “fetal blood absorbs oxygen more readily than ours because there’s less oxygen in the womb, and this tyke’s cylinder apparently duplicated the womb environment perfectly. Now he has to convert to adult-type hemoglobin like any newborn. It takes three months for a complete fetal hemoglobin turnover.”

  “Plus, everything’s growing,” said blond Corinne emotionally. “Every cell and organ in his little body. That takes energy. Another reason why newborns sleep so much.” A hesitation. “Will you keep us updated on his development? The first month especially?”

  Jill and Tricia traded looks. Saw Blondie gazing dewy-eyed at David. No surprise. He was gorgeous. Tall, rugged-looking, penetrating dark blue eyes, dark hair that kept falling over his brow.

  And like everyone else, Blondie had seen him in news chopper footage shoot a killer dead on a roof. Now he was cuddling an infant, stroking the little cheek with his index finger. What woman wouldn’t get all dreamy-eyed?

  “He’s going to be absolutely amazing,” Blondie crooned.

  David shrugged. “Or maybe he’ll just be a regular kid.”

  Tricia rolled her eyes, and Jill gave the woman a sour look. Gestured enough of this, and they went back to the window.

  The scary sign was still down there, its owner still hollering into his megaphone.

  “He’s gonna lose his voice,” Tricia whispered. “Be hoarse for a year.”

  “Is insulin findable at autopsy?” Jill asked.

  “Yes!” Tricia hissed low. “And you’re not going to sneak up and jab him dead.”

  “What about morphine?”

  “You know it is.” Tricia glanced up at her tall, slender friend, now frowning. “Something I gotta ask. At breakfast and rounds you were all tight-lipped and barely spoke to David. Wassup?”

  “We had words last night.”

  “A whole three months before your first ‘words?’ I should have such a relationship. I should have any relationship.” Tricia had been trying to lose weight lately. It made her cranky.

  Jill blew air out her cheeks.

  “I’m also just so damned tired of being afraid,” she breathed. “Of jumping at every shadow or threatening creep.” She hesitated, then her face crumpled as she looked at Tricia. “It’s suddenly like last July again. The nut jobs are back.”

  Tricia glanced over at the bored security guard the hospital had belatedly put inside the NICU, then looked back as if to say, See?

  No sale. “And when Jesse leaves the hospital?” Jill’s voice was despondent. “Grows up or tries to?”

  Tricia got it, fell silent, and Jill seemed to sink into a fit of abstraction. Behind them, the voices now droned about Clifford Arnett, M.D., PhD, former second-in-command of the hospital’s Genetic Counseling Committee, and world famous in reproductive endocrinology and infertility research.

  Also surprise crazy genius who had built Jesse’s cylinder and put him in it, done other research both stunning and shocking.

  Dead now. Fallen from the same roof on which David had fought him and shot to death his murdering assistant.

  A Texas voice: “Immeasurable tragedy. Brains and talent like that...”

  London: “But he started out nobly?”

  David: “So it seems. He wanted to increase immunity, delete inherited disease, and prolong life. His notes say he could snip cystic fibrosis and multiple sclerosis right out of the embryonic DNA. He didn’t say how.”

  “He must have kept further lab notes.” Corinne’s voice.

  “Somewhere. We’re still looking. He worked in an attic with a million nooks and crannies. Workmen have pulled it apart, and his regular lab-”

  “Excuse me?” Jill had stepped back to them. “If you don’t need me,” she told David, “I’ll be moving along.”

  “Where to?” His brow raised. He was still holding Jesse.

  Tricia sidled up and said, “I’ll bet she wants to go assault that religious nut with the sign-“ and got a quick look from Jill: Don’t.

  Too late. David handed Jesse to Tricia, explaining the SPAWN OF THE DEVIL sign. The others shook their heads, looked dismayed.

  “Whackos,” said one of the Texas Three. “We’ve got lots of ‘em.”

  “Catholics don’t even like IVF,” Corinne said. “But I’m Protestant. My pastor says God gave doctors the wisdom and ability to help people.”

  The researchers thanked Jill as she headed out. To her annoyance David was at her heels, with Tricia back holding Jesse and explaining to London in his flowered tie why Jesse didn’t seem to like Clapton or the Stones.

  “Just that Beethoven,” they heard her say. “I’ve got my iPod in case he wakes up.”

  3

  Jenna Walsh tried to open her eyes. She couldn’t. Her head was exploding. Her belly too. The pain, the pain…

  Grit from the cold ground dug into her cheek. Bits of glass, too, it felt like. She had to get out of here; got her eyes open a slit. The light was suddenly different. Darker, the shadows longer. How long had she been here?

  She had to get help. Her body trembled, but she managed to reach one hand out. Her fingers dug into the ground and she struggled, then clawed her way forward, inching toward the alley entrance. How stupid she’d been, to take a shortcut through here. Someone…who?...had attacked her from behind, punched and kicked her when she was down and curled into a ball with her eyes shut tight in horror. Oh God, why?

  Her belly was so heavy, but she scrabbled forward, on her left side mostly, her elbow and knee helping her to push herself. She was inching closer. Just yards ahead, she saw people on the sidewalk. Traffic out there, horns blaring.

  “Help,” Jenna cried in a feeble rasp. No good, too weak. They’d never hear her.

  It was moving, the thing her attacker had put under her sweater. It was writhing and snapping against her chest as if it, too, was trying to escape. Oh God…

  Whimpering in horror, with her head hurting more, she struggled past a green Dumpster.

  Then her vision blurred, and something sharp sliced through her left palm. She cried out and tried to focus on her hand, dripping red from a glinting glass shard.

  “Noo…” Shaking, on both elbows, she tried to pull out the shard, but her vision dimmed further, and suddenly it was hard to breathe. She heaved her shoulders up, her mouth open, and managed to pull in a gasp.

  “Help!” she cried again with her last strength, her voice ragged and desperate.

  She thought she saw someone glance her way, but a second later her vision quit. The alley around her flipped, and a high, queer ringing started in her ears. She gave up. Lay her head down on cold ground, struggling to breathe.

  There was a shout, and another shout. She was dimly aware of sudden footsteps around her, hands on her, voices shouting “9-1-1!” and “ambulance!”

  A gentle voice, bending close. “Who did this to you?”

  “Don’t…know.” Her gasp was inaudible. The ground beneath her swung crazily. Her eyes opened but she couldn’t see. All was black.

  “Can you describe your attacker?” The voice came closer to her face. Strong hands cupped her cheeks.

  “Didn’t see…” she managed.

  “You didn’t see your attacker?”

  “No. Came from…behind.”

  From far away she heard other voices.

  “No si
gn of rape.”

  “Found her purse, doesn’t look like robbery. Name’s Jenna Walsh.”

  “Jeezus! Oh God, what’s this under her sweater?”

  “Holy hell. Don’t touch, it’s evidence. Looks half dead anyway.”

  Please…get it…off…me…

  Her shoulders heaved desperately from air hunger. Her eyes squeezed in pain, her head hurting worse. Was that a siren she heard? Or the ringing in her ears? She felt hurried hands lifting her, voices babbling, a mask with new, cool oxygen placed over her mouth and nose.

  So kind, the people helping her.

  She wanted to tell them to be careful, oh please save yourselves, there’s a bomb in my head.

  It’s going to go off…

  4

  In Jill’s on call room, he leaned against the closed door with his arms folded tightly.

  “What’re you doing?”

  “Changing into jeans.” She had her pants around her knees.

  “What for? Your scrubs look like running pants.”

  Jill looked down. It was true, the navy scrubs both of them wore didn’t look like scrubs. Okay, they’d do. She pulled her scrub bottoms back up.

  “Who says I’m running anywhere?” She whipped over to her chest of drawers for oversized sunglasses. Peeked into the mirror at her intense, big green eyes as she put the glasses on, then pulled on a baseball cap low.

  “You look like a female Unabomber.”

  “That zealot’s hollering about Jesse! Outta my way.”

  She made for the door. He stopped her, putting both hands on her slender shoulders. “Lemme go!” She squirmed angrily, getting nowhere.

  “Maybe it’s the ones yelling with signs you don’t have to worry about,” he said, grappling with her. “Oof! Please stop. There’ll be plain clothes cops in the crowd, security cams-”

  “I want his ugly pic on my phone.”

  “We’re back on duty in twenty minutes.”

  “It’s enough!” She yanked away and stomped around the little room. Her hands raised helplessly and tears came, she couldn’t help it. “Okay, I’m a mess.” She pulled the glasses off and swiped angrily at her glistening cheeks. “I’m just…worried about Jesse. What’s going to happen to him?”

  “I’m worried too.” David’s voice softened. He left the door, exhaling, and took her in his arms. She slumped, melted into his hug, and felt comforted…for seconds. Then pulled away and resumed her stomping.

  And last night’s argument.

  “I found him and I love him,” she said.

  “He’s not a puppy.” David sank onto the chair by the bed and leaned forward tiredly. Their argument last night had lasted till one and they’d had to get up at six. Upset, neither had fallen right to sleep.

  “The problem,” he said slowly, “is us. We’re magnets for weirdos. Our faces have sold tabloids, blanketed the media. If you…” A hesitation. “…or we adopted him it would mark him for life, make him a target for every bully and whack job. If we went into hiding we’d still be recognizable, and he’d be tagged as that…freakazoid kid like July’s killer called him. Have you forgotten?

  “How could I?” She’d stopped, breathing hard, and stood glaring at the closed door.

  David stared unhappily at the floor. “Picture Jesse at age five, or fifteen. How will he feel knowing he was conceived in a lab and grown in a fish tank? That’s what mean kids will call it. Assuming religious nuts like your pal out there - who call him evil - don’t do worse to him.” A resigned gesture. “But if he gets adopted and grows up anonymously… Ow! What are you doing? My arm doesn’t bend that way.”

  She was pulling off his white jacket. “It’s chilly out,” she said, tossing it onto the bed, getting his camouflage jacket from a hook on the wall and pushing it to his chest.

  “Put this on. We can argue about the big thing later. For now it makes me crazy to hear any child called evil - a baby, for God’s sake! Don’t you just want to see? What if the cops and cameras miss something?”

  “They won’t.” David patted the bed. “Let’s just lie down for twenty minutes. Maybe we won’t get called right away and we can - ow, my arm doesn’t bend that way.”

  She was yanking on a sleeve of his camouflage jacket, and he let out a resigned breath. Jill was Jill, he knew. Relentless yet vulnerable, worried about everyone, and eerily smart. Saw and sensed things that others didn’t. Got into trouble too, sometimes bad trouble. Could be headed for a shouting match out there.

  He pulled on his other sleeve and a Denver Broncos cap.

  “No,” she said. “The whole world knows you’re from Denver.”

  He muttered something under his breath and switched to a Yankees cap.

  She wriggled into a long, striped poncho and pulled her shades and cap back on. Minutes later they exited the hospital not via the ambulance bay, but from its teeming front entrance.

  They blended. Passed TV vans and busy reporters, approached the rear of the crowd and edged into it midway. Excited spectators pushed against the yellow barriers cops had up to protect the E.R. entrance.

  The Zealot had taken a position away from other signs, stiff-backed to his stretch of barrier, facing the jammed sidewalk and yelling into his megaphone. He had wild, graying dark hair and was on the scrawny side. Mid forties maybe, red-faced and in a tan jacket. Sounded even angrier than before, probably because onlookers were hassling him.

  “That child up there is evil!” he hollered, pointing. “He has no soul! He isn’t even eligible for baptism!”

  “You go take a bath,” someone said, heading back to the pro-IVF signs.

  “Skip the bath,” someone else said. “Go to hell!”

  The crowd cheered. Zealot glared, redder-faced, just furious. Jill and David got out their cameraphones and snapped pictures.

  “Doesn’t God love all children?” asked a woman. Another woman in a sari cried, “What about Hindu children?” And a gray-haired man said, “What would you do with that baby if you got hold of him?”

  “That’s no baby! He’s the spawn of the devil! The world must be saved from him!” Zealot turned and jabbed his finger up to the hospital. “AND the devil’s workshop that created him!”

  His wheeling hand brushed a woman, whose husband had had it and lunged at the guy, raising his fist. It was caught by two uniformed cops protecting the peace and the First Amendment. They calmed the couple, who left muttering and shaking their heads. Gawkers came and left. Watched the Zealot like they’d watch any New York sidewalk performance, then edged away to watch the reporters, the cheering IVFers, or the SAVE AN EMBRYO bunch.

  Seeing people leave infuriated Zealot even more.

  “So you are in league with the devil?” he shouted at a departing back, eyes bulging in fury as he got the finger. “And you and you?”

  Jill leaned uneasily to David. “The hospital is the devil’s workshop?”

  “Maybe just obstetrics,” he said absently. She looked quizzically at him, then followed his gaze to one of the onlookers, a wiry man, maybe forty, with long, curling dark hair in a brown corduroy jacket. He was the only one really listening to Zealot, his intent, small-featured face taking in every word. The corners of his small mouth turned up as Zealot dealt with his detractors, turned down when Zealot went overboard.

  “Is that a fan or do they know each other?” David said low. He snapped a picture. Jill subtly snapped several. “Maybe both,” she whispered, watching as the wiry man stepped forward, smiling, to talk to Zealot; then smiled again as a young blond woman, very soccer mom, came forward too to hand Zealot a pamphlet, which he looked positively thrilled to autograph.

  They snapped Soccer Mom too, got her in profile as she turned and saw them. Checked out their faces, their navy scrub pants, and edged closer.

  “I’m a cop,” she said low.

  Jill was surprised. “Oh! What’s your name?”

  “Keri Blasco.”

  “What’s the pamphlet?”

  “P
icked it up in a church. Stay cool.”

  She spoke quickly and moved away, joined two men in plain clothes at the edge of the sidewalk.

  “She wore leather gloves,” David said. “Handled her pamphlet by its edges.”

  Jill nodded. Experience with their murderous stalker last July had taught them about fingerprints. “Professional.”

  She was watching the man in the corduroy jacket. He seemed to be trying to persuade Zealot it was time to leave, even took the megaphone from him. Zealot frowned and resisted at first, then finally looked tired and gave in. Together they gathered up Zealot’s things and headed out, onto the sidewalk and toward the downtown subway.

  “I’d so like to follow them,” Jill said.

  David checked the time. “We have to get back.”

  Jill’s phone buzzed. She answered, and for a second her face lit. “Hey!”

  She listened. Then frowned.

  “Be right there.”

  About the Author

  J.A. (Joyce Anne) Schneider is a former staffer at Newsweek Magazine, and a wife, mom, and book lover. Words and story ideas are always teeming in her head – “a colorful place!” she says. She loves thrillers…which may seem odd, since she was once a major in French Literature - wonderful but sometimes heavy stuff. Now, for years, she has become increasingly fascinated with medicine and forensic science. Decades of being married to a physician who loves explaining medical concepts and reliving his experiences means that there’ll be medical angles even in “regular” thrillers that she writes. She lives with her family in Connecticut.

  EMBRYO 2:

  Crosshairs

  Title Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17