Allegiance: A Jackson Quick Adventure (22 page)

Peering from behind the door – and the pistol – is the younger Roswell Ripley. The nanoscientist. He doesn’t resemble the man in the photograph on the wall in his lab. His cheeks are drawn and almost translucent. He looks ill. His brow looks glued into permanent concern, his bloodshot eyes sad but alert. They dash between George and me, matching our faces to those on the licenses. He exhales and his shoulders slump. The tension in his face eases.

He uses the revolver to wave us into his room. We slip inside and he quickly shuts the door before sliding a chair against it and up under the door knob.

“Nice gun,” George hasn’t taken his eyes off of it.

“Yeah,” Ripley glances down at it, “it’s my dad’s. A Smith & Wesson Governor. I’ve got it loaded with shotshell. You know, in case…” He walks over to a small chest of drawers, clicks the safety with his thumb and carefully puts the gun on top with the barrel facing the wall. The gun
protecting
him from my boss is called the Governor.

The room is small but clean. There’s the chest, an unmade queen-sized bed and a small desk. The desk chair is the one propped against the door.

“You can sit on the bed,” Ripley offers. “Why are you here? How did you find me?”

“Your dad told me to find you,” George says. “I kinda blew him off at first, thinking he was nuts. You know, everybody’s a conspiracy theorist when they get in trouble.”

“Right.” Ripley walks over to the desk and leans against it. “I get it.”

“Jackson here calls me looking for help, and we start talking, trying to piece things together. That leads us to Dr. Aglo at your lab.”

“You talked to Dr. Aglo? You’ve been to my lab?” Ripley folds his arms and stands. The questions sounded more like accusations.

“We wanted to find you,” I say. “George knew Dr. Aglo. We reached out to him. He showed us your lab. We were looking for clues as to where you might be.”

“What in my lab told you I was here?”

“Auto redial,” George answered. “The last number you dialed from the lab was the visitors’ center here. We figured you might be hiding out here.”

Ripley sits on the edge of the desk, relaxing the tension in his body. “Why are you here?”

“I need your help.” I stand up from the bed and take a step toward Ripley. “What you know could save my life.”

“The same might hold for you,” he says. “You might be able to save mine.”

Ripley is pacing back and forth, arms folded. "There is no real definition for what I do. The feds have many definitions for it. It's a taxonomy for a kind of research at the nanoscale."

"Which is?" I ask.

"Picture it like this," he stops for a moment and holds his thumb and index finger up as though he's pinching something. "This is a millimeter. It's tiny, but not really. A nanometer is one million times smaller than a millimeter. Rationally manipulating or designing a material to perform a function at that scale is essentially nanoscience."

"Like the carbon fibers they're building at Rice," George offers. "Enough of those nanoparticles strung together make a really strong fiber. A fiber you could use for a bullet proof vest or a more conductive power line."

"Exactly," Ripley says without any hint of surprise. He's focused. He's lecturing. "Now there are endless possibilities for this kind of work. Take the medical arena…" He's pacing again in the small space between the door and desk. "You can take a nanoparticle that identifies, targets, and eliminates certain kinds of cells. You can use magnetic nanoparticles, injected into the blood stream, that help clarify imaging."

"Like an MRI?" George is the good student; the attentive one at the front of the class.

"Yes," Ripley acknowledges without pause. "Some of those medical advances are being used by the energy industry for subterranean mapping. The easier it is to see, the greater the chance there is of accurately predicting the presence of oil or natural gas."

"There are other industrial uses," he adds with a tilt of his head, as though he is considering the alternatives. "Say, for example, the ability to inject a nanoparticle into household paint which helps it resist water penetration a touch better than before. These are all within the juxtaposed enormity of nanoscience."

"I thought nanoscience was some magical new deal that sent little robots into tiny places to fight, or fix, or change stuff," I admit with an embarrassed laugh. "I had no idea."

"Most people don't," said Ripley. "It's really not as romantic or as exciting as people think. We haven't even figured out how to create those 'nanobots' in such a way that they can perform under the heat, pressure, or chemical environment that exists ten thousand feet below the earth. I mean, we can make them, but they don't move. We can't get them to move."

"Is that what you're working on?" I ask. "Is that what all of this is about?"

"No," Ripley laughs as though the idea is ludicrous. "First of all, when I say ‘we’, I mean the nanoscience community. I'm not personally working on that part of the equation."

"Then what are you working on?" George asks. "How would it be so important, or controversial, your dad gets framed for an attempted assassination?"

"How would it endanger our lives?" I chime in. That's what I want to know. What really has us holed up in a small lodge in the middle of nowhere?

"It's a long story," Ripley says. He leans against the desk again.

George crosses his legs at the ankles, folds his arms, and settles in. "We're not going anywhere. We came here to get answers."

Ripley’s eyes dart around the room as if he's searching for the words. "It's complicated," he says finally.

"That's fine," George says. "Wait. I've got to record this."

"What?" Ripley waves his hands in front of him. "No. I'm not okay with that."

George stands and pulls out a small video recorder from his back pocket. It's like a flipcam or something. "You want us to save you? Then this is your ticket. It's a bargaining chip."

"It's also evidence," Ripley's voice is as a loud as a whisper can be without being a yell. "I'm not about to self-incriminate!"

"Calm down, Dr. Ripley," I step between George and the scientist. “Nobody’s asking you to do that. It’s insurance. Okay?”

“What do you mean by insurance?”

“What if something happens to you?”

He tilts his head, his eyes aim at the floor. He’s considering it.

“Better yet,” I raise my finger, “what if something happened to me or to George? There’s got to be some proof of what going’s on, of what you’re involved in. I mean, if someone’s willing to frame your dad and force you into hiding, don’t you need an insurance policy?”

Ripley bites his lower lip, his eyes still fixed down and to the left until he blinks himself out of his thoughts. “Fine. Record it.”

My phone rings.

George and I exchange looks. We’re the only ones with this number.

It’s an unknown number.

The
Saint
.

***

“What do you want?”

I step into the hallway outside of Ripley’s room. It is dark and empty, and there’s a slight echo.

“I know it’s you.”

“Very good, Jackson. You’re getting there, good man. You’re getting there.”

“How did you get this number?”

“Bribery works wonders,” he says. “Especially with a minimum wage electronics store clerk. I could have offered the girl a large cheese pizza and it would have worked.”

“What do you want?” I repeat.

“How’s the West Texas air? A bit dry?”

“I don’t have time for this.” I lean against the wall next to Ripley’s door and look left, then right. I’m alone.

“You
are
aware you’re not alone.”

The hallway is still empty. “We know about Pickle and NewMex and Aleutian Oil.”

“Pickle,” The Saint laughs. “It’s such a funny little name. Given your circumstance, quite appropriate don’t you think?”

“The suits that killed Bobby and tried to kill me are somehow connected to Aleutian Oil. They’re here somewhere. They’re following us.”

“I knew you were a smart one, Jackson. Good man. You’re with the good doctor now?”

“I thought you knew everything? Why are you asking?”

“My suggestion would be you separate yourself from him.” No laughter.

“What do you mean?”

“The men from Pickle want you dead. Of that, I’m certain. They would likely prefer Dr. Ripley meet an untimely end as well.” The Saint clears his throat and takes a sip of something. The sound of ice against glass clinks through the connection. “You’ve made it easy for them. You’ve led them straight to him.”

“They don’t know he’s here.”

“You found him didn’t you?”

“Yes, but—”

“Jackson, my good man,” he interrupts, “you’re smart. I assume George Townsend the reporter is smart. You’re learning the game, but don’t think for a moment that men with the kind of experience they employ at F. Pickle aren’t light years ahead of you at every turn.”

“Why haven’t they gotten us already?”

“They’re watching you, Jackson. They’re waiting. It is much easier for them to get three of you at once, than it would be to hit you individually.”

“What about Charlie?”

“What about her?”

“Is she on their side?”

“She’s on someone’s side, Jackson. It’s not yours. Who she is and what it is she wants I don’t quite yet know.”

“What do
you
want?”

“You need to survive, Jackson,” his voice deepens. “You are more important now than you were when you delivered the first iPod to London. You’re less of a pawn and more of a knight.”
Backhanded
compliments
? “I underestimated you in that bar. I saw a weak, needy, restless orphan willing to do anything for a father-figure and a pair of long legs.”

He pauses, clearly baiting me.

“I see much me in you. Your drive. Your persistence. Your ability to survive. Your raw intelligence. Oh, and your ability to keep secrets.”

“Whatever.” He disgusts me. I’m nothing like him.

“I do what needs to be done, Jackson.” The hallway is still empty. “Do what needs to be done,” he tells me. “We’ll both get the answers we need. You have to separate yourself from Ripley. I’m telling you it’s imperative.”

The phone goes silent and I slip back into Ripley’s room. If The Saint is right, we don’t have much time.

***

“The science is simple in theory,” Ripley starts, talking directly into the camera.

“Look at my shoulder,” George instructs. “Don’t look directly into the camera. It looks better when you aren’t staring into the lens.”

Ripley complies and starts again. “The science is simple in theory. To increase the fuel efficiency of a gallon of gasoline, you need to, in effect, amplify its octane. Fuel efficiency, in and of itself, is essentially thermal energy, right? If you take the potential energy you have in a drop of gasoline and you convert it to kinetic energy, you’re creating fuel efficiency. The better the conversion, so to speak, the better the efficiency.”

“How do you make it better?” George was holding the flip cam out in front of him, looking at the image of Ripley in the small LCD screen on the back of the camera.

“There are a number of ways to do that,” Ripley exhales, as though he’s irritated with a child’s repeated questioning. “You can increase the efficiency of the fuel itself. This is represented by its heat value, among other things. You can better the efficiency of the combustible engine, which goes to the processing of that heat and the conversion to kinetic energy. You can improve the aerodynamic properties of the vehicle; design and weight. All of those efforts improve the efficiency.”

“What is it you’re working on right now?” George widens the picture, zooming out.

“To explain that, I have to tell you what Nanergetix is doing.”

“So do that.” George zooms in again, awaiting the answer.

“Nanergetix is using nanoparticles to affect the potential energy in the fuel itself. There is only so much automobile manufacturers can do to improve engine efficiency and reduce aerodynamic drag.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s all well and good the Obama administration set these astronomical fuel standards in 2012. They’ve given auto makers until 2025 to make cars and small trucks run at essentially fifty-four miles per gallon. That’s a stretch. While the automakers are on board, publicly, the oil industry is fuming.”

George looks up from the LCD. “Could you explain?”

“Let me back up.” Ripley leans back against the desk and sighs. “Nanergetix is helping the auto industry, okay? Much of the funding for their work doesn’t come out of Don Carlos Buell’s pockets. It comes from the automakers. Detroit threw a lot of money at him when he decided to go green. The oil industry felt betrayed. He wouldn’t take their cash. He doesn’t need it. He’s on some mission.”

“And?”

“Nanergetix is essentially trying to use engineered nanoparticles to increase the convertible energy of every drop of oil. They add the particle in the refining process and it helps the gasoline stretch farther than it would otherwise.”

“By making gasoline go farther, we’d need less of it?”

“Exactly. Can you imagine the profit for a company that does that? If the government requires all petrochemical refineries to use that technology? We’re talking billions upon billions of dollars in perpetuity.”

“Buell is not popular with the oil companies?”

“Not at all,” Ripley says. “He’s persona-non-grata, which is why I believe it was the oil companies that wanted him dead. Without his vision, Nanergetix is nothing.”

“If he’s governor,” I interject, “he’s in a better position to control the legislation governing the industry.”

“Yes.” Ripley glances at me before returning his attention to George’s shoulder. “Nanergetix is getting increasingly close. Right now their efforts work only in a lab environment. They’re having trouble with the particles adhering beyond certain temperatures, but they’re close.”

“How do you know this?” I ask.

“Nanoscience is a very small community. When everything is under a microscope, it’s very hard to hide.”