Astounded that he was once again on two feet he had pushed his wheelchair himself into the common room of the Team ‘J’, crying profusely, naked and still carrying the largest erection the other team members had ever seen.
With special permission the next day he had flown home to his mother’s house and on his own two feet, without crutches and with no sign of a limp or any disability, he had walked through her front door carrying a bouquet of flowers.
.
Chapter Thirty Eight
The Meeting Room
Level 3, I.G.E.G.G.M Laboratory
Oxford, England
.
The Professor and Louisa were first in the lab on the Tuesday morning, and amid a few more tears and consolatory words from the Professor they waited for the others. Jason was first to arrive and was just about to ‘bunny up’ when the Professor stuck his head out of the meeting room door and called,
“Emergency meeting. Don’t bother with that for just now. Any idea where Don is?”
“No, but he’s always here before 8.45am. Should be here any minute now!”
Almost as if on cue, Don walked out of the elevator at the end of the corridor and passed the security guards, smiling and waving briefly as Jason acknowledged him and pointed at the meeting room. He was a minute behind Jason, and as soon as he had his seat the Professor announced rather gravely.
“We have a problem. We’ve been found out and spied on by the Americans...” Jason started to interrupt, but the Professor lifted a hand to intercept his questions. “…Since you’re going to find out eventually, the truth is probably best from the start. The fact is, Louisa’s boyfriend over at the Physics lab turns out to be an undercover agent for the States. He hypnotised Louisa, and following his instructions, she gave him the real Crown last weekend, and he swapped it for a fake. So, the one we’re giving back to the Frenchies this afternoon is not the real one. The real one is probably in America by now!”
He left it a moment for it to sink in, and Louisa started to cry again. The Professor put his hand briefly on her shoulder to console her, then continued.
“The first thing to make clear is that under no circumstance must we tell the French. The fake Crown will go back with all the reports that I’ve compiled from your work, and these documents will declare that it is does indeed come from the time period and geographical location that we understand to be where the crucifixion took place. After that, as far as I’m concerned they can stick the fake Crown in a glass case in the Louvre and have a million tourists look at it every year just like the Mona Lisa. I hope that’s clear.”
A round of nodding heads.
“The important thing is what we do now…I think we have no option but to tell the British government what has happened. MI6 and MI5 need to know what the American bunch have done.”
Silence for a moment. Then the first murmurings of revolution came from Don.
“Why? Let’s think what we’re trying to achieve here. I think this project has gone beyond mere science. Over the past few months, well, this isn’t just an experiment to make a clone anymore. This is about something far more important…something spiritual...”
Don had begun to blush, scared he was about to say something that would make him look foolish in front of the rest of the group.
“Go on Don, what is it you’re trying to say?” The Prof. urged him on, flashing him one of his encouraging smiles.
“Okay, fact is, before the Crown arrived I was pretty much an agnostic, but over the past couple of months something has changed within me. I can’t tell you what, but well, basically, I think I’ve found God!” He waited for a big reaction from the others, laughter or something, but there was just silence. Don continued.
“…God...as in I’ve found a faith in something bigger and more meaningful than science. And it’s all because of the Crown. I’m pretty much convinced now…no, let me be straight here, I’m certain, that the Crown really was the Crown of Thorns, and that it really did sit on Jesus Christ’s head, and that the guy called Jesus did exist! Which means that we are not just messing around with chromosomes and DNA. Our group is involved in something bigger than anything we could possibly have imagined. This little core team is trying to bring back Jesus Christ…It’s almost as if everything we do is blessed. So far, it seems as if we can’t go wrong! This thing IS going to happen you know, I can feel it in my bones. Last thing before I go to sleep at night, first thing when I wake up. What we’re doing here has real purpose! You Mathew, Louisa, Jason…and me…we’re going to make the Second Coming happen! And now we have a responsibility not to any government or church, but to ourselves and to mankind, and to God!”
Whether the others were just stunned by the passion with which Don had spoken, or by the content of his little speech, Don didn’t know. But no one said anything for a while. It was Jason who spoke next.
“I think that Don has something. Being Jewish, I can’t say that I’ve been affected in the same way that Don obviously has, but I have felt something. I think we all have. Okay, so let's think for a second about what Don just said. I agree, this work goes beyond national boundaries. It’s about creating a clone of Christ. Jesus Christ. Which for Christian Western society means ‘the most important person in human history’...”
“....Even if it doesn’t all work, or we find out that we’re just living in cloud cuckoo land…which we’re not…and we end up just producing a perfectly normal human clone from blood from some unlucky Centurion or some other person crucified round about the same time as Christ…even if that happens, we still owe a duty to the life we bring into the world. We can’t hand him over to the authorities to be brain washed and controlled and put in a cage to be examined all his life by other scientists like ourselves. No, we simply can’t do that!...”
“...So what if the Americans have stolen the Crown? There’s no guarantee that they will succeed in making a clone of anything. And if they do, the poor little guy will get the full indoctrination thing from the CIA and the NSA or whatever they call themselves nowadays...No…when our clone is delivered into this world, we’ve got to give the little guy a chance to grow up normally, free from any outside influences. Free to experience the world as it is...” Jason looked around the room to see if the others were still following him.
“... If he is just a normal little boy, then he’ll play in the streets with a tin can like any other and grow up and become an accountant or something, but if, and just imagine Don’s right, …if we’re lucky and the little guy does turn out to be the clone of the Son of God or the Messiah we Jews have been waiting for for thousands of years, then we’ve got to make sure He’ll grow up to fulfil His destiny, experiencing the real world as it is, and not be warped by the politics and the international pressures, and the crap that the government agencies would fill His head with. No, the fact of the matter is that we would achieve nothing by telling the authorities about our cloning programme. Nothing. But there could be a lot to gain from not telling anyone.”
Everyone turned to the Professor. This was his lab, and he was the senior and most respected person there. He had the most to lose. The choice was his. Louisa turned to him.
“I’m sorry I’ve done this...I’m really sorry…but I agree with Don and Jason. We’ve got to think of the baby that we’ll create. I’ve never really had any strong maternal instinct before, but listening to Jason and what he just said stirred something within me. We can’t let the authorities know what we’re doing, because they’ll take the child when he’s born. And no parent could ever hand across a baby to a life of being manipulated and moulded to their master’s voice like that. We have to ensure the baby clone will be given a fair chance in life…or we stop the programme right now!”
“That’s not an option," the Professor immediately replied. "Now the Americans might be making their own clone, we’ve got an even greater obligation to make a clone that will grow up free in a free society, and I agree that that won’t happen if we tel
l the British Government what we’re just about to do. And anyway, I agree with Don. The work we’re doing is something that we are meant to be doing. What we’re doing is something special. Very special. It’s not often that I’d admit it, but you young guys are right. My old age must have dulled my brain. So, we won’t tell anyone about this then, will we?”
Everyone smiled. Then Louisa shifted nervously in her seat and stood up, pacing round the room.
“We’ve still got a problem though…I’m meant to be providing the Americans with a copy of the process that Jason has developed for isolating the DNA from blood and reproducing the full chromosome set from it. I’m meant to hand it over next Friday!?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, Mike hypnotises me when I see him, and he gives me instructions to carry out...except the last time when he was doing it, the phone rang in his flat and woke me up mid session...he didn’t realise I was out of the trance and he carried on…I was fully awake and heard everything he said to me. Anyway, while he thought I was hypnotised, but wasn’t, he told me to get a copy of all Jason's notes and hand it over to them…That’s when I realised what I’d done and went straight to the Professor!”
“…yeah…At five o’clock in the morning...this morning!” the Professor added.
“You guys must be knackered!”
“…is the understatement of the year. Anyway, what do we do now?” Louisa asked, sitting back down in her chair.
“So, my take on this is that you have to be straight up with the guy and tell him he’s been rumbled, that it’s all over and that he won’t get anything more from you. Otherwise, what’s the point in carrying on the illusion? He’ll just keep pushing you for information...once you start, there’ll be no end to it!”
“I agree, we can’t ask Louisa to keep seeing the guy. I’ll go with her to meet him and tell him the game’s over…” the Professor volunteered. “Don’t worry Louisa, we’ll sort it out together.”
.
Chapter Thirty Nine
The Department of Engineering
Oxford University
Parks Road, Oxford
.
The Professor and Louisa marched into the University Engineering lab, and finding that the elevator still hadn’t been fixed, climbed the stairs to Mike’s office. It was twelve o’clock and Mike was just coming out of his office and heading off to lunch. He was in the process of locking his office door when he turned and saw Louisa and the Professor heading towards him down the corridor.
“Oops…I smell trouble...” He whispered to himself. It didn’t take a highly trained agent to see that the look on Louisa’s face meant business. Serious business.
“Louisa, it’s great to see you....” he said, trying to kiss her.
“Mike…don’t” she whispered back, turning her head to the side so that his kiss glanced off her ear. “I’ve brought my friend Professor Wainright along. We want to talk to you. Alone...”
“I guess we could use my office.” Mike replied, recovering his composure quickly from the spurned kiss.
“This won’t take long.” The Professor spoke, his voice dry, quick and very serious.
“So, take a seat. Fancy a coffee, or something a little harder?” Mike said, ushering them into to his room, and waiving at the chairs.
“No thanks.” The Professor waited for Mike to sit down.
“We’re not here to waste your time young man, so I’ll just get straight to the point. Louisa came to me last night after she left your flat. She told me everything. What you don’t know is that when you tried to hypnotise her last night she was wide awake. Woken by a telephone call from one of your CIA buddies.”
“What are you talking about?” Mike replied, panic immediately rising in his chest. He glanced towards the door to check if it was completely closed.
“Mike, I heard every word you said to me…I know you made me tell you everything, and that you hypnotised me to swap the Crown with a fake that you gave me…the Professor has even got it all on video disk, including some from an outside camera with you seen clearly sitting at the wheel of the car, waiting for me to get in and give you the Crown of Thorns.” Louisa started to cry. “…How could you do that to me? I was in love with you! You cheated me...you lied to me…raped me…abused me! How could you do that? How?” and she burst into tears as once again a wave of emotion rushed over her.
Mike sat there without saying a word. His face had gone bright red, and if the Professor hadn’t known better, he would have thought that tears were beginning to form in the corner’s of Mike’s eyes.
“Louisa...”
“Don’t even start to explain young man. We don’t want to know. We just want to tell you that you can just forget about the information you asked her for on the Haissem project. From now on you’ll keep away from Louisa. Away. Not a word. If she ever sees you again, or if you come within ten feet of her, MI6 will pick you up the same day, and you will disappear. Just disappear. Cappito?” The Professor could be a hard man when he wanted to be. “And you can tell your buddies in the NSA or CIA or whoever you are, that they have forty eight hours to get you out of Oxford and on a plane back stateside, or I’ll blow the whistle on you and the British Government will take over...”
The look of shock and pain on Mike’s face appeared to be genuine and for a second, just a fraction of a second, the Professor wondered if they were missing something or had somehow got it all wrong.
“No...no…I can’t do it...” And Mike looked at Louisa, jumping from his chair and hurrying around his desk to kneel beside her chair. “Louisa, I love you. I need you. I’m telling you the truth…”
Louisa appeared confused. For a second she hesitated and Mike saw the opportunity and went for it.
“Louisa, I’m sorry…so sorry. I was just obeying orders. I didn’t know I was going to fall in love with you. That’s real. I’m crazy about you. I need you.”
The anger came from nowhere, a tidal wave which swept through her body, carrying power and energy to every cell in her muscles. One minute she was sitting there listening to him tell her just how much he loved her, the next she was an animal, jumping at him and hitting him hard, her arms flaying and lashing out at his chest. Screaming. Shouting. Crying.
“You bastard…you bastard…you lied to me…you raped me…you RAPED me! You cheated me… ”
And then before the Professor could reach forward and pull her back, she was a pile of rags on the floor in front of Mike, weak and empty.
“I loved you Mike…I loved you....why? WHY?…I loved you…”
Mike reached out and tried to spread his arms around her shoulders to embrace her, but she pushed him back violently.
“Leave me alone…leave ME ALONE!”
She scrambled to her feet and ran out of his office. Mike started to move after her but suddenly the Professor was there, between him and the door. He was an old man now, but in the past week since his miraculous cure, strength had returned to his weakened bones and when he drew himself up to his full height of six feet he was still a force to be reckoned with. The hand that reached forward and pushed on Mike’s chest was strong and powerful, and sobering. Mike stopped and stared into the Professor’s eyes.
“…let me go to her…I love her...”
The Professor spoke slowly, his words clear and enunciated.
“I will say this only once. If you ever try to see her again...” He left the threat hanging in the air and turned and walked away without looking back.
.
--------------------------
The Ambassador’s Office.
The American Embassy
London, England
.
“What? What do you mean you’ve been found out? She woke up in the middle of the hypnosis? Be in my office first thing tomorrow morning. Without fail.”
The Ambassador slammed the phone down. He couldn’t believe his ears. He knew only too well the importance of this mission. The President him
self had taken a personal interest in the whole affair.
He was also acutely aware that the whole thing had got such high visibility within the CIA that failure to carry out the rest of the mission successfully could seriously affect the rest of his career. He only had another two years to run before he was due to retire.
If he messed this one up, or at least if Mike messed it up, he could end up spending those two years in some hell hole like South Africa or Australia.
“They say the death toll from AIDS in South Africa is one in three nowadays!” He thought to himself. He would be lucky to make it back alive. The Ambassador was not a happy man.
.
The next morning Mike dragged himself into his office at 8am as ordered. His hair was drab, and his youthful good looks seemed to have evaporated. The man who sat before him now was not the same man that had brought the news of the Haissem project so enthusiastically to him just a few months before.
“What the hell has happened to you man? You look as if you’ve been dragged through hell and back? Pull yourself together!”
The debriefing was a nightmare. Just trying to get any good information out of the man was like pulling teeth. Mike was in a bad way. It was now obvious to the Ambassador that Mike was suffering from a broken heart: Mike had been telling the truth when he had insisted that he had fallen for his contact in the Haissem team in Oxford. For a second he considered going easy on the man, then he remembered that South Africa was not a safe place to go nowadays, especially not for someone used to luxury and fine English living.
“Your orders are clear Mike. You will return to Oxford and you will get the information we need. I don’t care how you do it. It’s vital we have it. This is a Code Green project. Do you have any concept of what that means? No? Well, it means that you won’t get a second chance. If you fail to get the information we need within seven days, I will call you in and send you home. I’ll close the Oxford operation down. You’ll spend the rest of your days pushing a pen in some office in Washington. Understand?”
The Messiah Conspiracy - A gripping page-turning Medical Thriller - [Omnibus Edition containing Book 1 & Book 2] Page 19