The Zen Gene (15 page)

Trouble

8:40 PM

Western’s sour-gut told him things did not go as planned at the factory. He should have heard from Hunter by now and he was getting worried. He hadn’t heard from Dr. Mann but that wasn’t a surprise the Doctor was a long shot at best and he was probably halfway back to Thunder Bay. It didn’t matter, when he figured out he was not involved, he lost his usefulness. He had no faith in the guy anyway and the fact he did not call was hard to place in the hierarchy of problems facing him.

Earlier in the day the base commander, under pressure from Sergeant Peters’ wife, released the infected soldiers from quarantine and they presumably had gone home. It was bad luck that Mrs. Peters’ father happened to be the Brigadier General in charge of all of Western Canada’s Armed Forces. He was trying to watch television in the bedroom he used as a den but he could not keep his mind on it. He was worried that Hunter messed this up somehow.

“Damn. Why hasn’t she called?”

The words had only left his mouth when the phone rang and he jumped up to get it. It was not Hunter. It was Tom Waters, the assistant base commander. A call from him was not good news.

“Hi Tom,” he said.

“John,” Waters said without engaging in the usual pleasantries. “Do you have a Lieutenant named Patricia Hunter working for you?”

Western swallowed. “Yes sir.”

“A vehicle checked out in her name exploded and burned in Colwood a couple hours ago. What do you know about it?” Waters said.

Western swore under his breath. What the hell went wrong? He needed to get this guy off the phone quickly.

“Yes Tom she is one of ours and she is on a covert assignment in Victoria. I can give you the details if you give me a direct order but I feel I should warn you her assignment is classified and you might not want to know these particular details,” he said.

His lightly veiled warning produced the desired effect. The Major paused for a moment and then said, “Get this thing under control John before it eats someone’s career.” The Major hung up without saying goodbye.

He knew exactly how to play men like Waters. No mid-level bureaucrat would ever order him to reveal classified details he might later want to deny knowledge of. Anytime covert ops were involved the politically sensitive higher-ups knew it was a better career move not to be aware of the details. Now that Waters had been dealt with it was time to figure out what went wrong with his operation.

Sandwiches

11:19 PM

Andi came home from talking with Zen and went downstairs to look for them and he noticed she would not enter Tyler’s bedroom. She stood outside his door looking in and that made him smile.

“Zen is very upset,” she said.

He saw sadness in her eyes when she told him this. It was obvious what their son did to Zen weighed heavily on her. She smiled wanly as he stepped out and took her in his arms and held her and in that moment it felt like they were never apart. He thought he lost her forever and now with the situation spinning wildly out of control he worried he might lose her again.

He was worried Sergeant Nichol would die of his wounds. He looked bad and was unresponsive when they rolled him into the Emergency room and it was unclear how the legal system would view Tyler’s role in his death. Both deaths were directly related to what he was doing in the old factory and now with the additional complication of him infecting Zen with his POrna virus things were stacking up against the boy. It would destroy Andi if Tyler went to prison. He did not know what he was going to say to Zen as he walked across the lawn to her house. When he knocked on the door his basic goal was to convince her not to report Tyler to the authorities.

Zen looked pale when she opened the door but she stood aside to let him in and he took that as a good sign. He could see she had been crying. Without saying a word she led him into the kitchen where he sat across from her at the kitchen table. The house was almost exactly the same design as the one next door that Andi rented only this kitchen was yellow and hers was blue.

He watched Zen’s fingers as she sat slumped in her chair peeling an orange. He had always been fascinated by women’s hands he thought, in some respects, they were the most interesting feminine feature. Something about the animation and strength of slender female fingers always made him think of the creation of art.

He zoned out for a few moments until the tart scent of peeled orange roused him and he realized just how fatigued he was. Between letting him in and peeling the fruit Zen did not say much but she checked her cell phone at least ten times.

“Have you talked to your mom?” he asked.

“Yes. She’s in Saskatchewan delivering tractor parts, there’s something wrong with her truck again. She’s been having trouble with it lately.”

“Did you tell her what happened?” he said.

She lifted her eyes from the orange and looked at him like he was an imbecile. “Are you crazy? I don’t want her to have a heart attack,” she said.

When she spoke she flipped the hair away from her face and this girlish gesture reminded him how young she was, and looking at her face, even with the stress and being upset and tired, he could see that she was still a kid. “She will need to know sooner or later,” he said.

“I pick later,” she said and turned and tossed the orange peel into the kitchen sink. She was obviously still angry at Tyler and her movements showed it but there were things he needed to talk to her about which could not wait. His immediate problem was that she did not know him and had no reason to trust him.

She had been afraid of him when he opened the door at Andi’s house and he hoped this first impression could be overcome. It was clear Andi had never talked about him and then out of nowhere this strange man shows up and everything goes to hell.

“I’ve been thinking about what Tyler told you about infecting you with his virus,” he started. “I think he is wrong about what could happen. I don’t know if you are aware that I am a geneticist and I know there are many things including viruses which do not get passed from mother to child. In all probability he is wrong about your future offspring having the virus.”

He watched darkness gather in her face as her expression hardened and she looked him in the eyes.

“Like he’s been wrong about everything else?”

The tone of her voice left no room for arguing further on that point. He winced at the sharpness of her comment but he was also buoyed by her strength of spirit. This was a strong young woman, he thought, she will be a survivor no matter what happens. She was right to say that Tyler had been correct about most things. Her fears, given what was at stake, were well founded. There were many reasons for her to be upset about what he did to her not the least of which was it made a lot of assumptions about what she would do with her life.

Before he came over to talk to her Andi told him that Zen had completely freaked out on Tyler when he told her she will be glad to have a baby with the virus.

‘A baby will spread POrna all over the world,’ he said. When she started crying he tried to undo the damage by explaining to her how an infected baby would be a good thing for the world.

He looked at her face now and could not imagine what she must be feeling or what kind of horror movie scenario was running through her mind when she thought about someday giving birth to an infected baby. She must surely wonder, he thought, what else would be wrong with it.

“The problem is that Tyler does not understand that what he did was wrong. To him it was a perfectly reasonable action to take and it never occurred to him you would not want to do it,” he said.

After he said it he shook his head at the extreme awkwardness of how he was approaching this. He watched the negative effect his ill-chosen words were having on her. He decided to try a different tack completely.

“He believes you are his girlfriend. You realize that, don’t you?” he said.

She got up from the table and walked to the sink and spit an orange pip into it. She turned on the water and flipped the switch for the garbage disposal and used a finger to slide the pip and pieces of peel down the drain. The noise of the grinder saved her from having to respond to his question right away. The truth was she did not know how she felt or what she thought about any of this, not that there was anything she could do about it. The whole freaky idea of him giving her his stupid virus was creepy.

Did she want to know someone who would do a thing like this? The real problem was she had no choice about any of it. She was already infected and there was no way to undo it.

“I kind of understand what you’re saying. He thinks I’m his girlfriend and that made it okay to infect me because he doesn’t get the whole concept of right and wrong, like laws or rules. I get that part, but it still hurts that he would do that to me. I was sick in bed for over a week. I thought we were friends and then he treats me like some kind of lab rat to do his weird experiments on,” she said.

“Andi told me that when you were sick in bed and he refused to go to school and he came over every day to be with you,” he said.

“So what, he hates school,” she said.

He heard the bitterness in her voice and he knew he was losing his opportunity to reach her. He decided to get away from reason and facts and make one last attempt.

“Can I just say this, Zen? I know it’s not my place but I think you need to hear it,” he said.

He got up and walked over to her. He stood in front of her and looked her in the eyes. “In my heart I believe that he loves you, but he doesn’t have words to express what he feels. He cannot show you the normal signs of love a young woman would expect to see, but his actions reveal his heart. I do not profess to know how his mind works, but I have eyes and I’ve seen how he looks at you. No matter what you decide to do, please remember that what Tyler did was not from malice or indifference, it was from love. Remember also he created this virus because of something you said to him. He obviously sees a future in which you and he are together and this should tell you something of his feelings for you,” he said.

Her lower lip trembled and she turned her face away not wanting him to see her tears.

“I guess I know,” she said.

He put his hand on her shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze and then turned and walked to the door and let himself out.

When he got back to Andi’s he let himself in and found her flaked out on the couch.

“I think she will be okay, and I don’t think she will report him to the police or anything. So far she has not told her mom, but she has a lot of stuff to think about,” he said.

She sat up and he flopped down beside her and smiled.

“What did you say to her?” she asked.

“I told her he did not do it to hurt her and he’s probably wrong about the baby thing,” he said.

“Is he wrong?” she said.

He thought about it, shook his head, and grunted a negative.

“But he could be?” she said.

There was a tinge of desperation in her voice.

”I wouldn’t bet on it. To quote Zen, he has been right about everything else. If those two had a child together, which is not likely given how she feels about what he did to her, their offspring would almost certainly be a carrier. It would be somewhat less likely if she has a child with someone else but the bigger problem they face is not a child with the virus. It is when word about POrna gets out to the wider world they will be in danger,” he said.

“In danger from who?” she said. The look on her face showed equal parts confusion and fear.

“Almost anyone who has an interest in killing or controlling people, which includes arms makers, religious groups, governments, and probably a whole lot of people we can’t imagine,” he said. He felt her tremble as the meaning of his words sank in and he put his arm around her shoulder to comfort her and she drew closer to him.

“How can we protect them from that?” she said.

He understood the fear and turmoil she was feeling and he squeezed her in support. Her fears for Tyler and Zen matched his own. It was strange how only a few hours ago he did not know he had a son and now he found himself caring deeply about him and what might happen to him.

“I’m working on an idea. It is possible we won’t have to worry about any of this, but I do not want to discuss it with Tyler in the house,” he said.

She turned and looked at him questioningly. She was wondering why he did not want him there but she agreed.

“Okay.”

He wanted to keep her mind off the bad news, at least until he sorted out his thinking about the plan, and he changed the subject. “I told Zen he loves her,” he said.

He watched her face to see how she would react and he thought he saw something cross her eyes. It was only a flicker and it was gone as fast as it came but it meant something.

“No shit, Sherlock,” she said, smiling a little too brightly, and he noticed that too. “He has been crazy about her since they were little kids, and she has always adored him,” she said. This last statement was said with less enthusiasm and he remembered how complex Andi was emotionally. When they were together in Toronto he often found himself trying to guess why she reacted in a particular way and it was this past experience which allowed him to more accurately read her now.

He detected the hurt she was feeling in the tiny down-turned margins of her smile and when she spoke he realized her words were an attempt to conceal what she was feeling. It was also clear to him she didn’t want to appear foolish by revealing the petty jealousy she felt about Zen’s close relationship with Tyler, but she was having trouble covering it up. She watched his face and knew he was reading her, because he always could, and she decided it was time to steer the conversation towards another subject.

“Do you think it would help if I sent him over to her with some food,” she said. “I don’t think she has eaten all day.”

“I think that would be a great idea,” he said, hoping to defuse the tension his comment created by trying to be funny, “and if he comes back unscathed we will know my Svengali charms have worked their magic upon her.”

She could not help it, though she did not feel like it, she laughed. It was his crazy sense of humour that drew her to him in the first place.

“I will prepare the bandages in case your magic has weakened, Oh Great One,” she said.

She wore a smirk on her face when she said it and he knew he was successful. She made up a tray and called Tyler up from the basement.

“Zen is upset with you. I made sandwiches for you to take to her,” she said. He did not say anything because he was staring at the tray of sandwiches. “When you give them to her, if she lets you stay for a while, don’t eat them all,” she said.

She read Tyler’s mind and he chuckled when he heard her say it to him. He left with the food and she reminded him again as he walked out the door not to talk about viruses or babies. The door slammed and she watched out the window to see if she would let him in and when he did not come back she grabbed two beers from the fridge and rejoined him on the couch. He was sitting in the semi-darkness of the living room staring out the window deep in thought.

She handed him a beer and took a long pull on hers. It had been a dreadful day and she was weary but she knew they needed to talk about everything that happened and what they were going to do about it.

“Are you up for a conversation?” he said.

“Are you kidding? Where do you want to begin? Explosions, viruses, terrorists, weird genetics, or infected babies?” she said. There was an ironic half smile on her weary face. “There is no shortage of interesting and entertaining topics to choose from,” she said.