of the Charles with his head crushed. Before he fell in, a witness saw him on the rail of the Harvard Bridge in the middle of the night while another man smashed him on the head with a baseball bat.”
“Good God,” Warren said.
“A witness claimed the victim appeared to wait for the other to hit him. A mercy killing.”
Warren scanned the article. “We’re hoping to send them to heaven, instead we created a living hell. This is terrible.”
Stern cut in. “Before you get all worked up, he was a drug-addicted nobody.”
“That’s not the point. We can’t be sacrificing people to find God even if they’re street people.”
“Well, science often moves from the bottom up.”
Warren felt his face fill with blood. “These people talk, they have friends. What if the police trace them to us? Good God, we could be put away forever.”
“That won’t happen,” Elizabeth said. “We’ve taken every precaution imaginable.”
“But you don’t know?”
“Warren, calm down. There’ll be no more mistakes,” Elizabeth said. “We’ve turned the corner with a whole new category of test subjects—younger, cleaner subjects whose brains aren’t rotted out by drugs and booze and suffering delusions.”
25
“Hey, brother, we passed.”
“There’s a claim to fame,” Zack said. “We’re qualified to sleep.”
It was a little before noon when Damian called. It was Friday of the Memorial Day weekend, and three days had lapsed since Zack had sent Dr. Luria his medical records. In that time, Zack had received another overdraft notice from Bank of America for a check he had written just before his accident. The coma had cost him $125 in fines alone. He was now nearly $5,000 in debt.
“Yeah, but if you’re really tired, it might get the dogs off your butt.” Someone had called Damian to say that a car would pick them up at seven to take them to the center. Then he read off the restrictions: “No caffeine drinks after two P.M. No stimulants, alcohol, or sedatives. We can shower, but no use of conditioners, gel, mousse, and skin lotions—something about having good electrode contact with the skin. Eat normally and bring a change of clothes.”
A little before seven, Zack met Damian at the corner of Huntington and Massachusetts Avenues. “Nice T- shirt,” Damian said.
Zack’s front was the ancient Christian schematic of a fish, but with rudimentary feet and the word DARWIN fashioned like bones inside its body. “I can lend it to you if you ever experience existential doubt.”
Damian smiled. “Not going to happen, bro.”
At seven sharp, a black Cadillac SUV pulled up to the curb. A stocky man in a white shirt and dark pants got out and came around. “Is one of you Damian Santoro?”
“Yes.”
The man nodded, said his name was Bruce, and opened the rear door of the limo for them to get in. When they got in and Bruce closed the door, Zack noticed that a Plexiglas partition separated them from the front seat.
As the driver pulled away, he turned on the sound system, filling the car with classical music. They made a U-turn at Gainsborough and headed northeast down Huntington and onto the MassPike at Copley Square. After maybe twenty minutes, they pulled onto 95 South for another twenty minutes, then turned off at the Dedham exit and onto twisty country roads through Medfield and to a large white garrison originally intended as a private home.
Bruce escorted them through the main entrance, which had been converted into an office lobby with a receptionist. They passed some offices and through a door with steps to the basement. At the bottom, things changed into sterile white walls and fluorescent ceiling panels. Zack did not see the rear of the building when they entered, but it was clear that it had been extended to accommodate the corridor flanked by windowless doors.
The third door opened onto a spacious office crammed with desks, computers, shelves of manuals, books, and the like. Waiting for them were Drs. Luria and Stern and a black man introduced as Dr. Byron Cates. Also a younger good-looking young woman named Sarah Wyman, who said to call her Sarah. Zack guessed she was a medical or grad student somewhere.
Once again Zack and Damian were separated, Zack meeting with Sarah Wyman and Dr. Luria, Damian with the others. They moved across the hall to a small bright space with shelves of books and periodicals and a desk holding two large computer monitors. Across from it was a smaller desk where Luria sat. Zack took a seat across from her. On a table behind her sat a framed studio photo of a smiling little boy.
“We checked your medical records, and all looks fine,” Luria said. “But on your questionnaire you say here you’ve had recurring dreams of dead loved ones.”
“A few dreams of my father. He died three years ago, but my parents separated when I was ten, and I didn’t see him much.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Luria said. “Can you elaborate on those dreams?”
“Sometimes it’s stuff we did in the past. Other times he’d show up at the door.”
“If you don’t mind me asking, how exactly did he die?”
Zack could not see how this was relevant to a sleep disorder project. “Heart attack.”
Sarah said, “I’m sorry to hear that. Do you dream of any other deceased relatives?”
“No, and I thought this was a sleep study.”
Luria’s birthmark lit up again. “It is, and a primary component is the neurophysiology of dreams—the electrical activity that takes place when they happen. So we’d like to get a mapping of your brain.”
“Will I be put to sleep?”
“No, you’ll be completely awake,” Sarah said. “We’ll fit you with a helmet with electrodes inside, creating a weak magnetic field to stimulate different sectors of your brain.”
“Will I feel anything?”
“Not physically.”
“Then I will feel something.”
“That’s what we’d like to determine.”
She was vague so as not to influence his reaction. “But my brain won’t fry.”
“Hardly. The magnetic field is no more than that of an electric shaver.”
“Before we start,” Luria said, “we’d like you to sign nondisclosure and consent forms. Also, because we make a video recording of each session, a release should we use them in further studies or publications.”
Zack read the forms, then signed.
“If you feel even the slightest discomfort, let us know and we’ll stop.”
“Okay.”
Then Sarah led him out of the office and to a small, dim chamber with an observation window. In the space was a softly padded recliner with a pillow. He removed his shirt as Sarah attached contacts to his chest and to an EKG machine in the observation room. On his head she placed a motorcyclelike helmet with wires running from it to monitors and a computer in the other room. He was grateful his hair had grown to cover the pressure-gauge scar on his skull.
“This is a more highly sensitive electroencephalographic system than the standard device,” she explained. “There’s also a wireless sensor that communicates directly with the computer to analyze data and produce an electrical profile in real time.”
“Okay.” He watched her check the connections, admiring her clean good looks.
“We’ll put a sleep mask on to avoid visual distractions. Again, if you feel the slightest discomfort, just let us know. A microphone’s attached to the helmet to tell us anything you experience.”
“Like what?”
From the observation booth, Luria responded, “We’ll be applying magnetic stimulation to areas associated with different emotions and perceptions. So you may experience nothing at all or some sensations. So, just relax
