sweeping the floor with his good hand. “Help me find my fingers, man… Shit. My fingers. My fucking fingers.”
----- X -----
“Brian, it’s Barry… I just got off the phone with Consec Medical. You need to stop all work on Veraceo immediately. They’ve identified a health risk and they’re saying it’s serious.”
“What do you mean, serious?”
“I don’t know, but they’re sending a chopper to take us to Home Base for a briefing. The helicopter will pick us up from your lab in about two hours. I’ll come over and meet you there. One other thing. Consec Security are coming to the lab. They’re going to lock the place down and want all of your research notes and equipment. They’re going to move everything down to Pittsburgh so they have everything under one roof. They say they can control security better there.”
“Why do they need to control security?” Brian asked. “And what is this health risk. We’re in the middle of something here, Barry. We can’t just drop everything and...”
“...this is from Consec Leader himself,” Barry interrupted. “In two hours we’ll be brought in and given a full explanation.”
The call ended.
A health risk?
Brian looked around the workshop. The thing that caught his eye first was the hacked signal generator that produced the Viper-Sig.
They wanted to take everything to Pittsburgh?
His gut didn’t trust this. Untested partners suddenly claiming a health hazard. Locking up everything and shipping it out… No… You have to earn trust and so far his relationship with Consec had yet to attain that level. He packed the Viper-Sig generator into a box and pushed it through the building on a porter’s trolley.
“Hey, I just got a call from Barry Convex,” Peter said as he passed him. “He told me to pack everything in boxes and that a removal crew are taking the whole lab to Pittsburgh.”
Brian didn’t stop to talk. “Yeah, I heard. I’ve got to run an errand first.”
He dumped the Viper-Sig generator in the trunk of his car.
----- X -----
The Homeless Mission was on Bathurst and Adelaide, a building just as grimy and dilapidated as the street dwellers who relied on it. Each day at six, an evening meal was served of watery soup, but that didn’t stop the derelicts congregating around the entrance at all hours.
Brian went to the side door and pressed the buzzer.
A woman’s voice on the intercom. “Hello?”
“Bianca, it’s Father. I need to speak with you. It’s urgent.”
The room was dark woods and plain walls. Bookcases filled with a combination of leather bound encyclopaedias and reference books coupled with Bianca’s own specialised texts on sociology. She was wearing a grey trouser suit. She always wore a grey trouser suit in one form or another. Brian rested his box containing the Viper-Sig generator on her desk and took a seat.
“I haven’t seen you in six months,” she said. Her tone was cold. “Are you still angry at how I spend Mother’s inheritance?”
Brian shook his head. “No. In fact, I’ve made a lot of money recently. Many millions; and I’d like to give some to you. I’d like you to put it to use here.”
Bianca took the seat opposite. “But you hate the homeless?”
“I don’t hate them; I was worried that you were more concerned about them than yourself… Look, I don’t have a lot of time to go into this. The reason I came is I want to leave that.” He pointed to the box.
“What is it?”
“Technology.”
“And why do you want to leave it here? Is it stolen? Dangerous?”
Brian paused for a moment. “It’s an electronic device, but the technology within has the power to change the world; I mean that literally. Whether it’s changed for good or evil depends on who is using it. I was partnered with a venture capitalist firm to develop it but I’m not sure I can trust them. The situation has changed and I’m concerned that I don’t understand what is happening. I’d like to leave it here with you until I understand things better.”
“Is somebody going to come looking for it?”
Brian shook his head. “No. Nobody knows it exists, not yet.”
“So, how long do you want to leave it for?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m going to a meeting now that should clarify things. Hopefully, I’ll be back tonight and I’ll tell you what’s happening. I’ll tell you everything.”
----- X -----
The helicopter ride was bumpy and miserable, flying through rain and choppy weather. Barry and Brian barely spoke. Peter Fluorite was with them, his head buried in a book called Strange Wine. Brian wondered how he could concentrate on such a bumpy flight. By the time they landed the rain had become a torrential downpour and the first strikes of lightning flashed in the distance.
Home Base was as forlorn and miserable as he remembered. Brutalist concrete against a lake the colour of lead. The shotgun security guards were now covered in waterproofs but no less as menacing.
As they made their way into the building shaking the rain from their shoulders, Cue Ball was there to greet them. “How was your trip in?” he asked.
“Terrible,” Barry said. “We had to swim the last leg.”
Cue Ball gave a thin smile. “Brian, I’d like to introduce you to Doctor William South,” he motioned towards a grey haired man wearing delicate wire framed glasses and a dark blue suit. “William is deputy director of Consec Medical for our region. He’s going to brief you privately.”
“Okay,” Brian said.
William South shook his hand then ushered him forward. “Shall we?”
Barry and Peter Fluorite remained with Cue Ball, but as Brian walked away with Doctor South he was sure he heard Cue Ball tell Barry that Consec Leader was coming to meet with him personally. “What’s happening?” he asked the doctor. “I get the feeling this is serious.”
Doctor South took Brian to a meeting room with a white plastic table and two white chairs with red cushions. “Brian, I have some difficult news for you. It concerns the hospital results from when you were exposed to Veraceo-Two in Pittsburgh.”
“Go on.”
“In the tests, fluid was drawn off your spine to see what was causing the hallucinations and we discovered an overload of a particular protein called c-Myc.”
“Sea-Mick? What’s that?”
“In genetics, when your cells need to make a new protein, they find the gene for that protein on your DNA and duplicate the relevant part, it’s a process called transcription; c-Myc is vital for regulating transcription.”
Brian nodded. “I understand genetics,” he took a breath sensing where this was going. “So, tell me what the problem is.”
“Your brain fluid was overloaded with c-Myc. For some reason your production of c-Myc became unregulated. It was the same for the lady you went to hospital with. At first we saw this as an anomaly and began testing the other women working on the Pittsburgh production. We’ve discovered that everybody who has been exposed to Veraceo-Two has been affected in the same way… Brian, these are cancer proteins.” Doctor South stopped talking to allow the message to sink in.
Brian nodded shallowly. "Cancer… brain cancer?”
“We are treating the women from the Pittsburgh studio. They all have early stage brain tumours and we believe they were caused by Veraceo-Two. When we finish here we’ll take you to the clinic for an X-Ray and a few tests to decide if treatment is necessary, but I think you should prepare for the eventuality that what has happened to the Pittsburgh women has probably happened to you too.”
“What has happened to them?” Brian asked. “What are their chances?”
“Their chances are good. It has been detected quickly and Consec will provide them with the greatest medical care and expertise that money can buy, just as they will for you; but you need to prepare yourself that you may be facing a cancer battle.”
Suddenly Brian laughed out loud. He wasn’t sure why.
He’d invented a new type of television and it gave people brain tumours.
It was hilarious.
----- Chapter Four -----
Barry waited overnight for his meeting with Consec Leader. They put him in a boutique hotel and picked him up for a breakfast meeting back at Home Base. One hour later than expected, Consec Leader found him in the lounge.
“Barry,” he called out confidently. He had his hand ready for a handshake from the doorway to the centre of the room. “My goodness, I have made an unforgivably rude imposition on your time.” They met, their hands clasped together. Consec Leader placed his free hand over Barry’s to make a double handshake that he didn’t want to break. “We have important work to do. Please, come with me.”
He led the way to a bank of elevators and chose the floor with a key rather than a button.
The doors opened to pure white walls, ceiling and floor. The room was perhaps thirty feet square. There were no windows. There was a desk ahead of a bank of TV screens and a studio grade television camera. To the side were two red sofas with a chestnut coffee table between them. Further back was what looked like a reading chair surrounded by a wall of dangling crystals from ceiling to floor. There was a double bed, neatly made with a red cover. In the far corner was a spiral of glass bricks that Barry assumed led to a bathroom.
“Do you live here?” Barry asked.
“I have to move between Consec locations. The psychologists designed this place to suit my temperament. They say it is the most optimum environment to keep me feeling refreshed. White