Chapter 19

“Isaac,” USAF General Robert Armstrong said. He was dressed in a black shirt with white, slightly pearlized, buttons. It was neatly tucked into a pair of khaki slacks and his silver hair was cropped in a short military-style cut. A thick, silver mustache curled across his upper lip and looked, at least to Isaac, like the dead carcass of a small, rodent-like animal. Lines seamed his face as well but they were the deepest around the corners of his eyes and mouth, as if he laughed a great deal. He towered over even the relatively tall Director and was built like a tank. Broad-chested and thickly muscled, the aging General looked very fit for his age. He was an imposing figure that seemed jovial and non-threatening at first glance, until you saw his cool gray eyes. They were devoid of emotion, feeling, or caring. They were cold, lifeless eyes. The only thing left in them was the harsh intellect of a man who reduced everything he saw to a series of statistics and ratios. They took in everything around him and then dismissed anything he deemed unimportant or of no use to him, cataloging useful information he found for future reference.

They met in their usual spot, a greasy little diner on the corner of Rone and Kei Street. Isaac gestured for the man to sit down and he squeezed into the little booth, which was a tight fit for him. His knees even hit the underside of the table.

“I’m beginning to hate this hole-in-the-wall,” Armstrong said. A small smile touched his lips.

“They have the best pancakes in the city,” Isaac replied, taking a sip of his coffee. It was stronger than he liked. The bitter taste was just bearable enough to drink. “What is this about, General?”

“Now, now,” Armstrong shook his head and mimicked sadness. “Why does it always have to be business first? I enjoy our conversations so much. Would you rob me of that so soon?”

“I’m not paid to be your friend,” Isaac replied. He didn’t bother trying to hide the disgusted tone in his voice. He hated playing the General’s asinine games. “What is this about?”

General Armstrong lost all trace of humor to his face. It turned stony, his eyes coldly latching onto Isaac’s. He reached into the leather briefcase he carried with him and withdrew a folder that was practically bursting with papers. He slid it across the dirty table.

Isaac stopped it with one hand and picked it up. He opened it and found the photo of an older man with comically wiry, gray hair that stuck out of his head. He had deep wrinkles all over his face. His green eyes were hidden behind a pair of glasses with thick lenses.

“I assume you know this man.” The General’s tone was clipped and short.

“Dr. Emil Tiberius,” Isaac replied immediately. Anyone who kept up on current events would have recognized him. “The world’s foremost genetic scientist. He works mostly with plants and the last time I checked, not currently employed by Section 3.”

“I’ve recently recruited the good doctor for a special project of mine that I pushed through the Committee. One that I personally feel would do the world a lot of good,” he explained.

Isaac noticed a hint of something in the General’s carefully guarded eyes. Greed, perhaps? Or hunger?

“What kind of project?” Isaac asked, interested. If the General pushed the project through the Committee himself then it had to be something important.

Most of Section 3’s projects were brought to them by the scientists themselves, each one trying to get their ideas funded to further pursue them. They were either rejected or accepted by a majority vote within the Committee, a group of the government’s highest ranking officials with General Armstrong currently serving as their head. They met twice a month in highly secretive and heavily guarded locations to discuss several hundred proposals within the span of three days. It was rare for a Committee member, much less its head, to push his own proposal through. In fact, Isaac couldn’t remember a time when that happened at all.

“Dr. Tiberius is going to work on a serum to genetically enhance the capabilities of the human body,” the General explained, sounding pleased with himself.

“A super-soldier formula?” Isaac asked, disbelievingly. “What kind of enhancements are you wanting Dr. Tiberius to make for you?”

“I gave him no limits,” he answered, smug.

“He’ll end up killing someone,” Isaac replied, coming to realize the General already came to that conclusion and absolutely didn’t care.

“You break a few eggs, etcetera, etcetera.” He waved a callous hand to dismiss the idea altogether. “Just make sure the man gets everything he wants or needs. I’d hate to see you in line for your unemployment check if things go south.” He paused for a moment, as if considering something. “And that would be the kindest thing I could do. There are other things that would be far less pleasant.”

He let the veiled threat hang in the air, smiling at the barely controlled anger simmering from Isaac. Then he rose and left, leaving without another word.

Isaac watched the man go, his anger fading as the General left. He’d been threatened before, a hazard of his job he supposed, but never by the Committee. As far as he knew, they were pleased with the efficiency he brought to his office. Now its head was threatening him?

He stared at Dr. Tiberius’s dossier, a sudden and gnawing certainty that the General’s idea would end in disaster filled him. He controlled it by telling himself over and over again that this pet project would fail. A super-soldier serum sounded good on paper but the reality was, it was pure science-fiction. Even the world’s most notable geneticist wouldn’t be able to pull that off. Dr. Tiberius would fail and the project would be scrapped, and all his worries would be for nothing.

He placed a ten dollar bill on the table next to his empty, syrup smeared plate and left, taking the folder with him.