“I have two Ph.D.s,” I admitted. Actually three, but one had been merely honorary and subsequently withdrawn.
“How did the enzyme change?”
“Good question.” I quickly thought of an answer. “If I wanted to make a vaccine, this could be one avenue, a sort of attenuated virus.” Rumors said China had begun development, although rumors eventually asserted everything.
Her eyes got wide. “Yeah, that would work. Shaky ethics, though.” She had a Ph.D., too. As I said, she deserved a better job than the one we had. “Who’s doing this?”
I read her the serial number of the client. “I hope they have high ethics.” We often had doubts about our clients—and in this case, I had grave doubts. Or hopes.
We filed our reports marked by the categories Urgent and Alert, and destroyed our samples (terror prodding us to noble thoroughness), and thus our workday ended with the discoveries of a mutant virus proofreader that might devastate Iowa fowl at any moment; unfamiliar and dangerous worms on a digestive tour of pigs; safe soil (for now); and damning evidence of tinkering with an enemy epidemic. When I stood up, I felt dizzy from fear.
We left the lab, housed in what resembled a dreary warehouse in a part of Chicago notable for its dreary warehouses, and we went our separate ways. I enjoyed the warm evening air on my fear-chilled fingers. I wanted to go to the elevated train stop because I liked human company and got too little of it, aware more than ever that we could all die far too soon for no good reason. Sharing a train car with other passengers would bring me comfort. But as I waited for the train that evening, I heard a child’s voice.
“Look! Is he sick?”
I didn’t hear the response and instead decided to travel by other means and in safety, alone except for wraiths of fear and a never-vague memory of the feeling of a bullet piercing my chest. I left the platform, descended the station’s quaint old steps, and outside on the sidewalk, I raised my phone to call an autocar.
A man wearing military fatigues approached. “Dr. Li?”
This wasn’t going to be good, and lying wouldn’t help. “Yes,” I said.
“Could you please come with me?”
Fighting wouldn’t help, either. I canceled the call. “Of course.”
“Thank you,” he said. “I want you to know you aren’t in any trouble.”
I didn’t trust his words. Confucius and I both believed in benevolence. In his long life, he had suffered exile, arrest, and attempted assassination. I was already too much like him.
CHAPTER2
Irene heard voices from downstairs as she was getting dressed before dawn. She couldn’t make out all the words, but she recognized the anger. The farm family quarreled a lot, especially Alan and Ruby, sometimes right in front of Irene.
What was it this time? Her curiosity wrestled with her desire to respect their privacy, and curiosity won. She tiptoed to listen at the stairwell. She knew that Ruby, a stout and acid-tongued woman, did all the housework, begrudged rural life, and worried about money, since she kept the books and worked part-time at another farm or someplace. Alan did all the heavy farmwork and resented what he thought was an unfair physical burden. Their teenage son, Will, gardened, fished, and gathered food for the table—and he would slip away with his dog when the arguments got heated, too emotionally fragile for conflict. Irene suspected he’d been abused in his childhood, maybe by his parents, maybe by someone else.
They seemed to love each other, but the stress of the farm was testing that. She suspected that each one unconsciously believed that if they ignored Nimkii long enough, the problems he posed would somehow go away.
“It isn’t just a flag,” Alan said.
A flag? Probably to display in support of another government policy that Irene hated.
Ruby said something in return.
“I need your help to put it up,” Alan continued. “That’s all I’m asking for. They’re already bought and paid for.”
Ruby had a long response.
“The point isn’t more visitors,” Alan said. “It’s to show where we stand. That’s not going to drive people away.”
Will said loud and clear: “People aren’t coming because they don’t like clones.” Irene had never heard him raise his voice before.
“Cloning’s okay for animals,” Alan said.
Ruby said something about “too far away.”
“Okay, we’ll do it, Will and me,” Alan said. “You can stay here and stew.” Soon the back door opened and closed.
Irene returned to her attic room, finished dressing, brushed her hair, put on her college hat, and as a way to avoid going downstairs for a few more minutes, checked to see what her friends were saying online. More channels had gone missing. Again. But no, it’s not censorship, it’s holding people responsible for promulgating misinformation. The friends she could find were complaining about possible new travel restrictions. And her mother had created an illustrated polemic against rationing. That was so much like Mamá, but if she kept that up, pretty soon she’d be censored, too, or arrested for standing up for old-fashioned freedom.
How soon before the mutiny started? Because it would come soon, now just a matter of days—as far as Irene knew. Not soon enough. What could she do up in Wausau when it did? What would happen to the farm? She knew for sure what side Alan and Ruby would be on.
She also found out what displaying the flag was about: The United States had accused China of trying to infect Americans with the Sino cold. Flying the flag would show solidarity with the Prez in his effort to keep the country safe. Safe from the cold! The debate had already turned ugly, even though no one in America or even outside of China had been infected, at least according to official reports. Was the Prez really threatening quarantines? War? Direct reprisals for dissenters? Don’t worry, online chatter assured everyone, he’ll protect us! Others asked if the virus was already really here because they knew about people who were coughing,
