Chapter 8/9
Chapters Eight & Nine
Mon/June/2008 07:00 AM
Editor's Note - The chapters for the week of June
2nd are being posted early to avoid any missed
installments since I'll be unable to upload them at
the regular time. The next installment should be
posted as usual on June 9th.
Chapter Eight - Running Late - Right On Time
Renoir was running late. Not an uncommon occurrence, but one that irked him terribly. His shoes made little slapping noises as he rushed down the hall of the Health Sciences building and rounded the corner into the department’s entrance. Two of the graduate students were sitting at the front table. Both were long time students, the variety that never seem to wrap up their studies and actually move out into the working world. Renoir smirked, if they kept this up they’d be on the faculty soon! He didn’t know their names. Binky and Dooseldorf sounded good enough to him. Binky was a big, fat guy. Even now, he was sitting at the table, munching on a cinnamon bun as he talked to Dooseldorf, who looked up from the paper as he saw Renoir walking in.
“Good morning Dr. Renoir.”
Renoir nodded his head and walked past them. The receptionist was sitting at the front counter, talking on the phone. He turned right and saw Sandy’s office. The door was open, but the manic woman was nowhere in sight.
The rest of the place was quiet. A few of the faculty’s office doors were open, but he would have expected more, considering the type of people they had coming. He had a paper to discuss with the latest editor, a young guy named Mike or Nick or something. He could never remember it. They’d had so many editors over the years, owing to drama with Sandy or their pure irritation at Raj, that he had long ago stopped getting to know them. Most of the time he just edited his papers himself. Never-the-less, he ducked into the young guy’s cubicle to ask him a question, but found only an empty chair. The computer was on though, which meant only one thing, he was off with that student assistant again. That had been going on for months. Renoir hadn’t said anything, since a part of him admired how very French it all was. What was the point at working at a college if you couldn’t get away with the important stuff. He and Isabelle had been the same way when they’d met during his post-doctoral work.
Renoir glanced into Raj’s office. He wasn’t there either. Thank God. He’d have a few moments of peace to sit down at his desk, flip through his papers, and gather his energy for the day. He had a feeling he was going to need it.
* * *
“So what’s the plan?” Nina asked.
“What do you mean ‘what’s the plan?’” David fired back.
They were marching down the corridor behind the hospital PR guy.
Jeff said nothing. His mouth was held tightly closed as they careened through the building. Students bustled past him. This was bringing back memories from years ago, high school, when he and his best friend had snuck into this same campus to play with the college’s computers. They had no idea what they were doing at the time, but now he knew they’d been laying the groundwork that had made their fortunes. Sometimes that bothered him. It felt like he’d had a part in one big thing, the creation that had made him his money and set him off from the rest of everything. His other projects were never that successful, but the funny thing was, he was so fucking rich, he couldn’t seem to spend the money fast enough. He’d lose several billion dollars, only to find that interest, investments, and shares in the original goose, the one that laid his golden eggs, had once again gone up in value. Weird how things worked out.
“I just don’t think this guy is producing.” Nina was saying. “And I know Jeff feels the same way.”
“About..?” Jeff asked.
David and Nina looked at him with darting, confused eyes.
“About Dr. Gupta not producing,” Nina replied.
Jeff gathered his thoughts. Time to stop daydreaming. Whether he made the money back after he lost it, that was beside the point. He hated losing money, but more than that, he hated being fucked with. This guy Raj Gupta was fucking with him. Jeff stopped walking. Nina and David took another couple of steps, turned around, and walked back to him. The PR guy, who was about ten feet in front of them, also stopped and stood in the middle of the hallway, looking back, wondering if he should walk back to them. David shot him a glance that said, Mind your business. Jeff took a step back into a recessed doorway.
“I think this asshole is producing, but I don’t think he’s producing what we asked for. We probably don’t even want to know what the fuck he’s been doing with the money.”
Nina looked at him - her eyes two cold, gray marbles.
Jeff continued, “I just want to come in, confirm my suspicions, then get out of our arrangement with him. I feel like we’re funding a weapons maker.”
“Are we?” David asked. “How much do we know?”
Nina held her gaze on Jeff as she answered, “Enough.”
“And what do we do once we pull the rug out from under him? Run off with his work?”
“No,” Jeff responded, “We call Ransom at the FBI.”
Chapter Nine - Looking Around
The little boy was looking at them, but Tim felt nothing. That’s what he told himself.
His team’s scouts had entered the building through the maintenance stairwells. Their goal was take in the general situation before they started the big show. Once the first ten of them had made it past the security counters, they fanned out and began weaving their way through the corridors and back halls of the hospital’s research facilities. Their weapons were all hidden away under their fire department uniforms.
Tim walked out of the stairwell and into the main hall. Two of the men directly below him on the chain of command, Guy and Myer, were walking on either side of him. Their expressions were set. Tim’s face was blank. He was here, but his mind and his heart were detached from the events at hand. This was a task that had to be carried out. There was no choice in the matter, like breaking the turkey’s neck -- setting its head on the chopping block, it was necessary if a man wanted to feed his family, wanted them to survive. No one would give his people what they needed, they had to take it for themselves.
The little boy sat on the carpet in the emergency waiting room. He must have been five or six years old, tops. Tim watched him as he and his men passed by, their heavy boots thumping on the linoleum floors. The boy was playing with a metal fire truck, pushing it back and forth in place, making “rumming!” sounds to himself. The boy stopped short as he looked up, catching his breath. His awed expression, the sparkle of innocence in his eyes -- if Tim had any doubts about their mission, he would have felt them then. But he didn’t. He couldn’t. Besides, no one was going to get hurt, no one in this wing of the hospital anyway, that wasn’t part of the plan.
Tim caught Myer glancing at him from the corner of his eye. He clenched his teeth and walked faster. They were almost to the entrance of the Health Sciences Building.
* * *
“Sir, you have been receiving and spending very large checks from my organization for the last several years, and now, I'd like to know where that money has been going!” Jeff spat out.
“If you’ll listen to me, I can explain how your funding has been put to excellent use.” Raj said, his heavy accent unfurling the words down the length of his tongue.
Nina stepped forward. “We’ve seen your usual progress reports, we’re just interested in seeing some actual progress-”
“Well it doesn’t work that way!” Raj interjected.
“Yes, it does,” Nina shot back. “We’re not the NIH. We can pull the plug if you don’t cooperate.”
They were standing at the entrance to Raj’s lab. The one in the basement. Jeff looked around him. It was almost exactly like he had pictured it. Science fiction white hallways, brushed metal doorways and trim, double doors at the entrances to adjoining wings.
They'd entered the Department of Immunology’s conference room at twelve o’clock sharp, and they were down in the labs ten minutes later. Jeff knew he had met this Gupta fellow before, but he'd remembered the guy’s handshake immediately. Gupta’s hands were dry and chapped. Scientist or not, this was never a good sign. Jeff took it as a warning that the guy’s life was not in balance. Dry, irritated skin meant a lack of personal awareness, which meant a numbing to one’s own comfort and position in the world, which revealed detachment from the physical, the immediate, which meant trouble. Detached people missed the simple things, the obvious facts, they were also much more likely to compromise their values, or rationalize actions that lead to tragedies. Some might have found Jeff’s thinking a tad melodramatic, but that was okay, he could afford to be that way, and in his experience, melodramatic or not, he was usually right.
Raj had given them the tour, but he’d shown them nothing. He wouldn’t take them into the backrooms. Jeff could see through the windows into the front of the labs, where workers in white coats bustled back and forth. In Raj’s lab they’d been shown only a row of monkeys, each hooked up to a series of monitoring devices. None of the animals looked sick. They sat in their cages, IVs and catheters dropping from their bodies, clear plastic tubes fed through the metal bars of the cages. There appeared to be no research going on.
Nina was rattling off their demands.
“We’re going to need a detailed report on your findings, the status of the project, and an explanation of where all of this is going before we’ll release the next round of funding.” She paused. “And we’re going to need some video documentation and live demonstrations.”
“These are highly unusual demands for a research grant,” Raj sputtered.
“Like I said, we’re not the government. This is private money we’ve been giving you, and in return, you need to give us a little information back. We need to know we’re funding the right individuals and that we can trust the work you’re doing.”
Raj stared back at her, momentarily caught off guard.
“Trust the work that I’m doing?”
Jeff nodded.
“For all we know, you could be building a weapon down here instead of a cure.”
Raj said nothing.
“Are you cutting my funding?”
“Let’s just say we’re putting things on hold,” David cut in.
“For how long?”
“That will be discussed,” Nina replied.
“Mr. Pepper,” Raj stammered. “I am doing important research, everything I’ve done has been relevant to the intent of your grant.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” Jeff responded.
“What do I have to do to make your happy?” Raj muttered.
There was a moment of silence, then Nina cleared her throat.
“Why don’t we go upstairs and talk that over.”
Chapter Eight - Running Late - Right On Time
Renoir was running late. Not an uncommon occurrence, but one that irked him terribly. His shoes made little slapping noises as he rushed down the hall of the Health Sciences building and rounded the corner into the department’s entrance. Two of the graduate students were sitting at the front table. Both were long time students, the variety that never seem to wrap up their studies and actually move out into the working world. Renoir smirked, if they kept this up they’d be on the faculty soon! He didn’t know their names. Binky and Dooseldorf sounded good enough to him. Binky was a big, fat guy. Even now, he was sitting at the table, munching on a cinnamon bun as he talked to Dooseldorf, who looked up from the paper as he saw Renoir walking in.
“Good morning Dr. Renoir.”
Renoir nodded his head and walked past them. The receptionist was sitting at the front counter, talking on the phone. He turned right and saw Sandy’s office. The door was open, but the manic woman was nowhere in sight.
The rest of the place was quiet. A few of the faculty’s office doors were open, but he would have expected more, considering the type of people they had coming. He had a paper to discuss with the latest editor, a young guy named Mike or Nick or something. He could never remember it. They’d had so many editors over the years, owing to drama with Sandy or their pure irritation at Raj, that he had long ago stopped getting to know them. Most of the time he just edited his papers himself. Never-the-less, he ducked into the young guy’s cubicle to ask him a question, but found only an empty chair. The computer was on though, which meant only one thing, he was off with that student assistant again. That had been going on for months. Renoir hadn’t said anything, since a part of him admired how very French it all was. What was the point at working at a college if you couldn’t get away with the important stuff. He and Isabelle had been the same way when they’d met during his post-doctoral work.
Renoir glanced into Raj’s office. He wasn’t there either. Thank God. He’d have a few moments of peace to sit down at his desk, flip through his papers, and gather his energy for the day. He had a feeling he was going to need it.
* * *
“So what’s the plan?” Nina asked.
“What do you mean ‘what’s the plan?’” David fired back.
They were marching down the corridor behind the hospital PR guy.
Jeff said nothing. His mouth was held tightly closed as they careened through the building. Students bustled past him. This was bringing back memories from years ago, high school, when he and his best friend had snuck into this same campus to play with the college’s computers. They had no idea what they were doing at the time, but now he knew they’d been laying the groundwork that had made their fortunes. Sometimes that bothered him. It felt like he’d had a part in one big thing, the creation that had made him his money and set him off from the rest of everything. His other projects were never that successful, but the funny thing was, he was so fucking rich, he couldn’t seem to spend the money fast enough. He’d lose several billion dollars, only to find that interest, investments, and shares in the original goose, the one that laid his golden eggs, had once again gone up in value. Weird how things worked out.
“I just don’t think this guy is producing.” Nina was saying. “And I know Jeff feels the same way.”
“About..?” Jeff asked.
David and Nina looked at him with darting, confused eyes.
“About Dr. Gupta not producing,” Nina replied.
Jeff gathered his thoughts. Time to stop daydreaming. Whether he made the money back after he lost it, that was beside the point. He hated losing money, but more than that, he hated being fucked with. This guy Raj Gupta was fucking with him. Jeff stopped walking. Nina and David took another couple of steps, turned around, and walked back to him. The PR guy, who was about ten feet in front of them, also stopped and stood in the middle of the hallway, looking back, wondering if he should walk back to them. David shot him a glance that said, Mind your business. Jeff took a step back into a recessed doorway.
“I think this asshole is producing, but I don’t think he’s producing what we asked for. We probably don’t even want to know what the fuck he’s been doing with the money.”
Nina looked at him - her eyes two cold, gray marbles.
Jeff continued, “I just want to come in, confirm my suspicions, then get out of our arrangement with him. I feel like we’re funding a weapons maker.”
“Are we?” David asked. “How much do we know?”
Nina held her gaze on Jeff as she answered, “Enough.”
“And what do we do once we pull the rug out from under him? Run off with his work?”
“No,” Jeff responded, “We call Ransom at the FBI.”
Chapter Nine - Looking Around
The little boy was looking at them, but Tim felt nothing. That’s what he told himself.
His team’s scouts had entered the building through the maintenance stairwells. Their goal was take in the general situation before they started the big show. Once the first ten of them had made it past the security counters, they fanned out and began weaving their way through the corridors and back halls of the hospital’s research facilities. Their weapons were all hidden away under their fire department uniforms.
Tim walked out of the stairwell and into the main hall. Two of the men directly below him on the chain of command, Guy and Myer, were walking on either side of him. Their expressions were set. Tim’s face was blank. He was here, but his mind and his heart were detached from the events at hand. This was a task that had to be carried out. There was no choice in the matter, like breaking the turkey’s neck -- setting its head on the chopping block, it was necessary if a man wanted to feed his family, wanted them to survive. No one would give his people what they needed, they had to take it for themselves.
The little boy sat on the carpet in the emergency waiting room. He must have been five or six years old, tops. Tim watched him as he and his men passed by, their heavy boots thumping on the linoleum floors. The boy was playing with a metal fire truck, pushing it back and forth in place, making “rumming!” sounds to himself. The boy stopped short as he looked up, catching his breath. His awed expression, the sparkle of innocence in his eyes -- if Tim had any doubts about their mission, he would have felt them then. But he didn’t. He couldn’t. Besides, no one was going to get hurt, no one in this wing of the hospital anyway, that wasn’t part of the plan.
Tim caught Myer glancing at him from the corner of his eye. He clenched his teeth and walked faster. They were almost to the entrance of the Health Sciences Building.
* * *
“Sir, you have been receiving and spending very large checks from my organization for the last several years, and now, I'd like to know where that money has been going!” Jeff spat out.
“If you’ll listen to me, I can explain how your funding has been put to excellent use.” Raj said, his heavy accent unfurling the words down the length of his tongue.
Nina stepped forward. “We’ve seen your usual progress reports, we’re just interested in seeing some actual progress-”
“Well it doesn’t work that way!” Raj interjected.
“Yes, it does,” Nina shot back. “We’re not the NIH. We can pull the plug if you don’t cooperate.”
They were standing at the entrance to Raj’s lab. The one in the basement. Jeff looked around him. It was almost exactly like he had pictured it. Science fiction white hallways, brushed metal doorways and trim, double doors at the entrances to adjoining wings.
They'd entered the Department of Immunology’s conference room at twelve o’clock sharp, and they were down in the labs ten minutes later. Jeff knew he had met this Gupta fellow before, but he'd remembered the guy’s handshake immediately. Gupta’s hands were dry and chapped. Scientist or not, this was never a good sign. Jeff took it as a warning that the guy’s life was not in balance. Dry, irritated skin meant a lack of personal awareness, which meant a numbing to one’s own comfort and position in the world, which revealed detachment from the physical, the immediate, which meant trouble. Detached people missed the simple things, the obvious facts, they were also much more likely to compromise their values, or rationalize actions that lead to tragedies. Some might have found Jeff’s thinking a tad melodramatic, but that was okay, he could afford to be that way, and in his experience, melodramatic or not, he was usually right.
Raj had given them the tour, but he’d shown them nothing. He wouldn’t take them into the backrooms. Jeff could see through the windows into the front of the labs, where workers in white coats bustled back and forth. In Raj’s lab they’d been shown only a row of monkeys, each hooked up to a series of monitoring devices. None of the animals looked sick. They sat in their cages, IVs and catheters dropping from their bodies, clear plastic tubes fed through the metal bars of the cages. There appeared to be no research going on.
Nina was rattling off their demands.
“We’re going to need a detailed report on your findings, the status of the project, and an explanation of where all of this is going before we’ll release the next round of funding.” She paused. “And we’re going to need some video documentation and live demonstrations.”
“These are highly unusual demands for a research grant,” Raj sputtered.
“Like I said, we’re not the government. This is private money we’ve been giving you, and in return, you need to give us a little information back. We need to know we’re funding the right individuals and that we can trust the work you’re doing.”
Raj stared back at her, momentarily caught off guard.
“Trust the work that I’m doing?”
Jeff nodded.
“For all we know, you could be building a weapon down here instead of a cure.”
Raj said nothing.
“Are you cutting my funding?”
“Let’s just say we’re putting things on hold,” David cut in.
“For how long?”
“That will be discussed,” Nina replied.
“Mr. Pepper,” Raj stammered. “I am doing important research, everything I’ve done has been relevant to the intent of your grant.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” Jeff responded.
“What do I have to do to make your happy?” Raj muttered.
There was a moment of silence, then Nina cleared her throat.
“Why don’t we go upstairs and talk that over.”