by Bill Myers
O’Brien paused a moment to let the conversation cool. “It’s not going to hurt us to put off the transplant a few more weeks.”
“He’s scheduled for execution in thirty days.”
“So have your federal guys talk the governor into a stay.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Kenny, I just don’t understand the rush. What would it hurt —”
“Look, if you want to run this thing, then you come back here and run it!”
“Kenn —”
“The guy is off the prison grounds and in a local hospital. His behavior is exactly as we hypothesized. And this latest beating is the perfect alibi to keep him out of circulation for the next several weeks. I’m telling you, the timing couldn’t be better.”
“Have you checked with him?”
“What do you mean?”
“I remember you conveniently forgetting to mention anything to him about a bone-marrow transplant when I was there.”
“He’ll go along with us. What other choice does he have? Besides, I’ve already pulled his stem cells and infected them.”
“You’ve already pulled his marrow?”
“He was unconscious when they brought him in, what better time? The departments here are top rate. X-ray has the sophistication to kill the cells, and their isolation ward is good enough to keep out infection until he can regenerate new ones. I’m telling you, it can all be done right here and now.”
O’Brien’s head spun. He knew that a bone-marrow transplant was necessary, just as it had been with Freddy. It was one thing to give Coleman the virus injection every few days to infect his new blood cells as the old ones died off. But those effects were only temporary. To make them permanent, one had to actually change the way the blood cells were made. And since blood cells are manufactured inside bone marrow, it’s necessary to change the marrow.
“It’s like a car factory,” he had explained to little Julie. “They make red and blue and green cars. But if you want a bunch of polka-dot ones, you can either stand outside the car plant and individually paint each car as it rolls out, or you can install new machinery inside the plant that automatically makes them polka dot.” That was the case with Coleman. They could either change the blood cells one at a time, or change the bone marrow — the blood factory — itself.
A bone-marrow transplant was simple enough. Insert a needle deep into the big bones, such as the pelvic bone. Do this fifteen to twenty times to withdraw an adequate portion of the gooey red bone marrow. This is where the stem cells are located, those tricky, hard-to-find cells that actually produce the white and red blood cells. Once outside the body, the marrow is infected with a virus that instructs the stem cells on how to create the new kind of blood. When these stem cells have been reprogrammed, they are reinjected back into the body. In theory, this would allow Coleman to create the new blood all on his own, permanently.
In theory.
“I’m telling you,” Murkoski said, “we’re all set here. Just say the word, and we’re on our way.”
O’Brien was losing control of the situation. It was time to test the waters. “And if I don’t give the go-ahead?”
He was not surprised by the pause on the other end. Nor was he particularly shocked at the answer when it finally came. “We’re talking about a lot of money here, Phil — not to mention power. A lot of rich, influential people who will be very disappointed in us. In you. For crying out loud,” he blurted, “we’re about to change the entire course of human history!”
O’Brien said nothing. He suspected there was more. He was right.
“To be honest, I don’t think McGovern or Riordan or any of your board would be too happy to let this type of money and prestige slip out of our hands…”
O’Brien closed his eyes and waited. Here it came.
“…slip out of our hands and go someplace else. No, they would not be happy with that at all.”
O’Brien took a long, deep breath. Just as he had feared. If he pulled the plug now, Murkoski would go to the board. No question about it. He had the audacity and the ego to do that sort of thing. But that was the best-case scenario. The worst case would be that Murkoski would simply quit and go to another company. The kid would pick up all of his toys (along with all that government funding) and go find a company that was willing to let him continue at his own accelerated pace. It was blackmail, pure and simple. Of course, there would be lawsuits and court battles, but by then it would be too late.
O’Brien stalled, trying to change tack. “What about the execution?”
“We’ll be running the GSR as soon as his risk of infection stabilizes and we get back to the penitentiary.”
“Will you tell him? About the GSR test?”
“I don’t think we can. If he knew what was going on, it would ruin the results.”
“That seems rather cruel.”
“Of course it does, but can you think of any other way to get an accurate reading?”
O’Brien couldn’t.
“I’m also nailing down the other details,” Murkoski continued. “The Witness Protection guys are making contact with somebody in our area. Looks like we may have ourselves a little bonus in that department. Also, I’m flying out Hendricks, one of our own electricians, to rewire the chair.”
“Everyone back there is sitting tight on this?” O’Brien asked. “Only a few people will know the execution is a fake?”
“Not even the coroner. She’s going to get sick that day and will be replaced by an assistant she doesn’t even know about.”
O’Brien was weakening. “But what about the mice?”
“Have Wolff run the gels and get back to me. I’m sure it was just mishandling, maybe some mislabeling. Typical techie incompetence.”
“And Coleman? If something should go wrong with the execution? If he should accidentally…” O’Brien searched for the right word. “Expire?”
“Then we’ll find someone else.”
“Kenny…”
“Listen, Phil, it’s time you realize that this program is more important than one man’s life. Or, for that matter, several.”
A dull cold tightened around O’Brien’s stomach as his worst fears resurfaced. Did this kid know any boundaries?
“We’re talking about changing the human race here. With stakes like that, a few sacrifices, especially like a Michael Coleman, are of little consequence. Not when you look at the big picture. Besides, he’s scheduled to die anyway, what’s the difference?”
O’Brien’s head began to ache. Again, he changed the subject. “If you’re successful, if we get him out of there alive and free, how will we convince him to keep working with us?”
“I’m adding a viral leash to the marrow. If he doesn’t come to us every five to six days, his body will create such massive quantities of cytokines he’s going to feel like he’s having the flu five times over.”
O’Brien’s intercom buzzed. He tried to ignore it, but it continued. He pressed the button and snapped, “I thought I said no interruptions.”
“I’m sorry, Dr. O’Brien, it’s Mr. Riordan, line two. He insists on talking to you about the epidermal drug.”
“Can’t he wait?”
“He’s pretty insistent.”
“I’ll be with him in a minute.”
“He wants to speak to you now.”
O’Brien rubbed the back of his neck and spoke into the phone. “Kenny?”
“Yeah, I heard.”
“Okay, look, it’s your call, but give it another day, all right? Phone me tomorrow and let me know your final decision.”
“Phil —”
“Twenty-four hours won’t hurt anything. And it will give you an extra day to catch your breath and think through any options. All right?”
Another pause. Then, “All right.”
“And please be careful.”
“No prob, Phil. Talk to you tomorrow.”
Before O’Brien could respond, Murkoski hung up. The
CEO of Genodyne Inc. took a long, deep breath. He had done the right thing, he was certain of it. Even though he felt spent and used, at least for now he had done the right thing.
That thought provided little consolation as he reached for line two, preparing for another confrontation with his most demanding board member. Dr. Philip O’Brien did not much care for his job today. And he was caring for it less and less as the day dragged on.
Kenneth Murkoski smiled as he hung up the phone inside the pre-op room. He’d pulled it off without a hitch.
A nurse already in scrubs poked her head into the room. “Dr. Murkoski?”
“Yes?”
“The patient’s prepped. We’re ready to begin when you are.”
“Excellent.” He stuffed the cellular into his pants. “I’ll be right there.”
“Don’t you mock me!”
“I wasn’t —”
“I’m still your mother.”
Katherine’s mind replayed the scene again and again. It was a continuous loop. No matter what she did, she couldn’t stop the memory of Eric’s voice or hers.
“ ’Scuse me…’scuse me,” she called to the passing bartender. He was a cutey, in his early twenties. “Give me another one of these…these, what are they called?”
The bartender grinned. “Surfer on Acid.”
“Right.” Katherine nodded. “I’ll have another…” The name had already escaped her. “Another one.”
“Don’t you mock me!”
“I wasn’t —”
“I’m still your mother.”
“I wasn’t —”
“I demand your respect, do you hear me?”
Though her brain was fogging, the scene wasn’t. It remained as clear as when it had unfolded nearly two hours earlier.
It had been another long and trying week. The IRS was closing in fast, demanding she pay for some honest miscalculations made over three years ago.
“How can I pay what I don’t have?” she had pleaded for the umpteenth time over the phone.
“We can work out a payment plan, Mrs. Lyon, but this is the United States government — and you will pay.”
She’d had a similar conversation with her store’s landlord that same afternoon. Same basic threat, same bottom line. Bills were piling up faster than she could keep track. Now she was dumping her mail on the floor at the end of the sofa, refusing even to open it. Not that she had time. With work and shopping and creditors and chauffeuring Eric, she had time for nothing.
Except the booze. And the guilt.
The only daughter of a Baptist minister, Katherine had grown up in a strict, religious home. No one drank in her family. In fact, she had not even tasted beer until she was a senior in high school. Even as an adult, drinking had never been a part of her life. Oh, she and Gary would have an occasional glass of wine during one of those rare and infrequent dinners they couldn’t afford, but that had been merely an attempt by the young newlyweds to be sophisticated.
Then Gary had been murdered, and everything went wrong. Her trust in a loving God. Her belief that good people were protected from evil. Her fights with her father. And on one particularly rough evening, the visit by a well-meaning friend with a four-pack of wine coolers to help her get through.
What relief they had brought. What blessed, numbing relief. For seven weeks she had been trying to shut down her mind, to stop the pain. Nothing had worked. But there, in those four little coolers, she had found the switch. Those few hours were the only peace she had known in nearly two months of visiting the hospital, enduring the death and the funeral, pretending to be the strong police officer’s widow, the faithful preacher’s kid. Those four bottles had given her more comfort than any of the hundreds of well-meaning clichés and spiritual bromides shoved at her by friends and relatives.
It was a comfort she had pursued more and more often until she had slowly lost herself to it. That’s when she had taken a stand, sworn it off, allowed her dad to enroll her in AA. He was no longer welcome to speak about his God, but he was welcome to help her kick the booze.
And he had. He’d been there every minute she’d needed him. Until eleven months later, when he’d died of a massive coronary, and whatever vestiges of faith Katherine had were snuffed out. It was then she had moved halfway across the country to get away from the suffocating do-gooding of friends and family, to make a go of it in a world with little compassion and no mercy.
She could make a go of it, she was certain. She just had to lessen the pain.
“I demand respect, do you hear me?”
The boy mumbled something she couldn’t hear.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“What did you say?”
“I said what am I supposed to respect?”
That’s when she had hit him. Tears had immediately sprung to his eyes. Not tears of pain, but of betrayal. He’d tried to fight them back, but couldn’t.
It was then, seeing the expression in her son’s eyes, realizing what she had done, that she’d called Lisa and asked her to baby-sit. She had to get away, she had to stop the pain.
“Here you go, Ma’am.”
She looked up surprised as the bartender placed another drink in front of her. She thanked him and asked, “How much do I owe you?”
“No charge. The gentleman over there sent it.”
Katherine followed the boy’s gesture and squinted at an oily-looking fellow in a worn suit sitting at a nearby table. He raised his glass to her and smiled.
Katherine turned back to her drink. Her last binge, three years ago, had proven to her that men were pigs, animals waiting to take advantage of another’s weakness. She would not fall into that trap again.
“Tell him no thanks,” she said, fumbling for her wallet. She may be a drunk, but she wasn’t for sale.
CHAPTER 6
“WHAT’S GOING ON?! WHAT are you doing?”
The two men said nothing as they finished strapping Coleman’s left arm and leg to the gurney. They had entered the room while he slept and pinned him down before he had a chance to awaken. Now Coleman fought, but with little success, as they forced down his other side and strapped him in.
“What is this? What are you —”
His shouts were cut short by a roll of gauze shoved into his mouth, then quickly sealed in place with surgical tape. Coleman breathed hard, nostrils flaring, eyes wild. He raised his head, trying to see faces, but was quickly shoved back down onto the gurney.
Three weeks had passed since the bone-marrow transplant. His recovery was on schedule, and just that afternoon he had been transferred back to the prison hospital. He had complained about having to sleep on a hospital gurney for the night, and they’d given him some excuse about a lack of beds. Now Coleman realized — too late — that there had been another reason.
Again he raised his head, this time searching for Murkoski. Lights flickered on, and he squinted into the brightness. Again his head was forced down, and this time it was held in a rigid hammerlock by two muscular arms. He tried to bite the arms, to shred them with his teeth, but the man was a pro. Coleman couldn’t move an inch.
Suddenly there was electrical buzzing and a harsh scraping atop his head. They were shaving his hair! Why? The only time they shaved a death row inmate’s head was…
Adrenaline surged through Coleman’s body. He twisted and strained, but accomplished nothing. The straps and arm-lock held him firm. Suddenly he heard the distinctive squirting sound of an aerosol can spewing foam and felt cold lather smeared onto his head. Then came more scraping, slower this time, burning and stinging — a razor nicking and cutting his skin.
Shaving the head was the first step in executing a condemned prisoner. It assured the cleanest contact between the skin and the electrodes implanted in the chair’s headband. But not now. Not tonight. They were eleven days too early!
Hadn’t Murkoski carefully explained it? To keep everyone happy, they would have to stage a mock execution with all of the
frills. It would be the only way to convince the public that he was actually dead. And it would have to include everything, the whole nine yards: staged before witnesses, verified by the prison physician, confirmed by the county coroner, extensive coverage by the media, everything to satisfy the folks who wanted to see him fry. But not now. The date had already been set by the courts. He was scheduled for execution January 14. This was January 3!
Now they shaved his left calf, where the second electrode would be placed. The circuitry of the chair was simple. There was a three-and-a-half-foot gap between the chair’s head electrode and calf electrode — a three-and-a-half-foot gap that needed one condemned prisoner to slip in and make the circuit complete. That circuit contained 2,450 volts. It would shoot through him, immediately knocking him unconscious and disrupting his heart’s electrical pattern.
But not for Coleman. His was to be different. And it was scheduled to be in eleven days, not now.
Unless they were pulling a double-cross.
With their attention on his calf, he was able to raise his head again and look around. Still no Murkoski. Just the two burly men. Coleman might have been able to take them out, if he could move. But he couldn’t.
A moment later they smeared a clear, oily gel over the top of his head and then his calf. This was standard procedure to insure maximum contact between the metal electrodes and human flesh.
They pushed open the hospital door and wheeled him out of the room. Coleman’s mind raced as they headed down the hall. Seventy-five feet later they arrived at the elevator. Beside it was a blue door and a narrow flight of stairs, the stairs he would have taken if he’d been allowed to walk to his execution. They keyed the elevator, and it opened. They wheeled him in, and the doors closed. As they rode down to the first floor, he tried to read the two men’s faces, to make human contact with them. But neither would look at him.
The elevator came to a stop, and the doors rattled opened. He raised his head. He was sweating now, and the tiny rivulets carried the gel down his forehead and into his eyes. It stung fiercely, but he forced himself to keep them open. Directly across from the elevator was the closed door of the execution chamber. To his immediate right was the control room that would hide the humming transformer and the man who would rotate the single dial. The man would be paid around three hundred dollars to stand behind that door and twist the dial on and off four times.