Vela opened the door to his sparsely furnished apartment on the third floor of the security building. He took a step inside, paused for a moment to wave a hand over the activation panel to turn on the lights and air system, and continued on a few steps. When he didn't hear Mendel's steps behind him he turned around and looked over his shoulder to look at Mendel.
“You coming in?” Vela asked.
“Uh...yeah. It just feels weird to be walking back into your life like this. I don't even know what 'this' is,” Mendel said, as he let out a long thin breath between his teeth.
“Weird for both of us, I'm sure. Come on in and sit down. No matter what other concerns we might have about each other, we're still brothers. I'm hurt that you left like you did without any explanation of where you were going and why.” Vela paused for a moment to think about something, and looked over his brother, observing his skin again. “You know, that skin condition of yours... they found a cure for it just fifteen years after your disappearance. I don't think anyone's ever lived past, oh, I don't know, twelve hundred without having that skin condition cured. How'd you survive it?”
“A cure? I've been suffering all these years and there was a cure? I didn't know. I should have...”
“Should have come home? Should have communicated with your wife? Should have stayed with your daughter? I've thought about how this conversation was going to go so many times I'd almost scripted it out in my mind. I didn't think that you'd ever become so worried about yourself that you wouldn't even ask about Cassie and Ara! Are you really even my brother? Because you sure aren't the person who I called my brother when we were both only a couple hundred years old.”
“I'm sorry Vela. I can see that I've worn out my welcome. I'll see myself out.”
Mendel had not yet taken a seat, and had only partially made his way through the door, and he turned around and slowly walked through the door. As he walked, he could hear Vela's voice calling after him.
“Don't walk out on us again, Mendel. They won't be able to take it again. Cassie won't be able to take it.
“Us? What do you mean 'us'. Cassie's... alive? And Ara? Where are they, Vela?” Mendel had turned around and walked all the way into the living room where Vela sat in his armchair.
“I didn't mean to tell you like that... I somehow envisioned a much different reunion than this.”
“Where are they, Vela? I want to see them.”
“Don't get all worked up Mendel. They've gone out to complete their food transport for the Gathering. They should be back by morning. This close to the Gathering, we take rotating shifts around the clock to make sure that all the ceffyls have enough food and water.”
“How are they? I'd given up hope that I'd ever see them again. I figured that the way my skin has been virtually tearing away, that there was no way that I would ever see them again, especially not Ara! You know what the survival rates were for children of our generation just as well as I do.”
“Yeah, but like I already told you, they found a cure for it after you left. Don't get all worked up over this Mendel. And if you want this little reunion to go smoothly, you'll need to calm down, and get some rest. You have to get some sleep so that your skin doesn't frighten them too badly when they see you again. We don't have time to get to the medical center to transfuse my blood to yours. That's the only way we have to spread the cure now that Earth is destroyed.”
“Vela, you're coming with me. We'll be back before morning, and I'll be cured. Menkalinan! Bring us both back now!”
“Menka... what? Who are you...” Vela's question was cut off as he and Mendel lost sight of Vela's living room and reappeared in the observation room of Mendel's star ship.
“Menkalinan. Menkab for short. He's my partner in crime, if you will. He's been my only company for the last, well, you know how long it's been. Come. I'll introduce you to him.”
Mendel led Vela out of the observation room and down the hall to the medical labs. Once they had both entered the room, Mendel sealed the door, and took a seat in front of a blank table, and motioned to Vela to take a seat next to him at the table.
“Alright, Menkab. Show yourself to Vela.”
“Certainly, Sir. I'm proud to meet your brother. You've told me so much about him, and I've always wanted to meet him.”
Slowly, Menkab's avatar appeared holographically on the table in front of them. He turned towards Vela and spoke directly to him.
“It's a pleasure to meet you, sir,” Menkab said. Vela turned to Mendel and said “He sounds just like... Dad.”
“You can talk to him, Vela. He's nearly sentient. I've spent millenia working on his heuristic algorithms.”
“Yes, Vela, you may speak and interact directly with me as you would anyone. Are you ready to begin the procedure?”
“Wait! What procedure? What are you guys talking about?”
“Calm down. I just need you to place a finger on the terminal in front of you. Menkab has highlighted the sampling location with bright green. He just needs a small sample of your blood.”
“Blood? What the heck are you talking about?”
“Vela, sir? If you'll place your finger on the terminal, I'll extract a small sample of your blood. I'll be able to sequence your DNA, and since it's so similar to Mendel's, I can isolate the cure for Mendel's skin disease in approximately forty-three minutes. It will take me a further twelve minutes to synthesize a gene splice that can be given to Mendel. Using the technology we've developed together, we can accelerate the process of the splicing, and he should be virtually a new man in six hours and thirty-three minutes.”
“Mendel, what's all that garbage this talking space junker just blurted out?”
“Please, just put your finger on the green light. You won't feel a thing, and it will be over and we'll be home in time to see Cassie and Ara when they return. You don't have anything to worry about. Just relax!”
Vela reluctantly moved his finger toward the green light, which suddenly moved directly under the pad of his index finger. The light momentarily brightened, and Vela felt a small pinch and it was over.
“See, now that wasn't so bad!” Mendel was speaking with more energy and vitality than he had in years. He knew it would soon be alright. He would have Cassie back, and his beloved Ara, the pride and joy of his existence.
Grus sat back in his chair, riveted by the scene that had just played out in front of him on his security monitor. Vela Omicron was Mendel's brother! How could he have missed that! It should have been one of the first things he discovered. Perhaps he had overlooked it because Vela was chief of Grus' staff, and had been loyal to him. It couldn't possibly be true that the most wanted man in the Galaxies was the brother of one of his men.
This moment filled him with such satisfaction that he had not experienced but one other time in his career. That was the day twenty-five years ago when he'd accepted the assignment to his current post; the result of the assassination of his predecessor and subsequent framing of an innocent man with the murder.
Grus pressed the power button on his holographic terminal and turned it off. He took a deep breath, smiling wryly, and put his feet up on the terminal. He rested his elbows on the arm rests of his chair and pressed the ends of each of his fingers against their matching opposites, and closed his eyes. Everything was too good to be true. He was well on the way to strong-arming the Monarchs to give him everything he had ever dreamed of; an entire world of his own, free from the watchful eyes and governance of the Monarchy. He could almost taste it.
Mendel couldn't remember the last time he'd felt so good as he did right now. There were still twenty minutes or so until the gene splice would be ready, but he was already feeding off the shear anticipation of being whole after so many years, let alone the prospect of being with his wife and daughter again. He had dreamt of it so many times he didn't even bother to count them. The dreams all ended the same way... with him waking up in a hot sweat and a complete and total disorientation. It seemed to take hours sometimes to get himself righted again, fully grounded in the reality of his loneliness and solitude wherever he was in space at the time.
Vela was enjoying some sort of food in the galley, which, oddly enough, was still equipped with a standard Earth-based kitchen, that included the customary oven, range, and other kitchen implements along side the food replicator. The dish he was eating was also of Earth, and presented him with a balance of proteins and carbohydrates and other important nutrients.
“Man, Mendel, this stuff is really great for coming from the dust in the air or wherever it comes from. I could eat like ten bowls of this!” Vela was quite excited, having gotten over the anxiety of returning to the planet's surface to be home before Cassie and Ara returned from their work.
“I'm glad you like it. Menkab is quite the chef,” said Mendel. Menkab piped in his automatic gratitude response.
“My pleasure, sir. Would you like something to eat as well?”
“No, I'm way too excited right now to eat anything. Shoot, I can't even sit still any more.”
With that, Mendel leapt to his feet and began pacing up and down the hallway between the galley and the bridge, deliberately counting the steps between the rooms. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, pause, turn left, and go back again. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve... dang, I lost count. No, I just took bigger steps. I've got to do it again. Mendel repeated the ritual for the next three or four minutes until he realized that all this seeming energy was really just an adrenaline rush that was quickly beginning to wear off. His knees were beginning to shake and almost buckled a couple of times on his last turn down the hall. He returned to the galley, and announced to nobody in particular that he was going to go and lie down until the splice was ready, and he could begin healing himself.
He entered his room, left the door open so as not to alienate Vela from him after their renewing their relationship, and half-sat, half-collapsed at the end of his bed as his knees finally did buckle. Mendel rolled onto his back and slipped into a shallow dream state. Ancient visions of his wife and young child flitted through his mind while his eyes rolled around inside their lids, and the lids themselves flapped halfway open and closed rapidly. His breathing was also shallow and rapid. He woke after about fifteen minutes at the gentle grasp of Vela's warm hand on his cold shoulder.
“Menkab says the sequencing didn't take as long as anticipated, even though he'd adjusted for our being brothers. He said our DNA was almost ninety-eight percent identical. How did we not ever find that out, when we were originally spliced? Anyways, we should get you down to the sick bay or medical room or whatever you call it up here and get this show on the road. From what your computer says, this might be much more painful than it was for our first time through. Back on Earth, we were sedated for the procedure, so I don't recall any pain, but we'll have to see how it goes. Can I help you up?”
Mendel did not respond vocally, but found enough strength with Vela's help to sit up, rise to his feet, and make his way down to the on-board medical labs. Once there, Vela again helped Mendel to move his body onto one of the examination tables and gently lay his head down. He remained nonvocal and began to return to semi-consciousness. Menkab's muffled voice was ringing in Mendel's ears as he finally passed into total unconsciousness.
“Vela, it appears that Mendel is incapable of treating himself with the splice. Will you help me do it? I'll give you instructions as we go, but we must begin soon. It appears that all the excitement he's had in the last twenty-four hours have served to weaken his heart. My simulations indicate that if we can begin the splice, his heart will be repaired as his DNA is re-written. You were right also, Vela. This is going to be extremely painful. Please turn to the computer panel behind you, and press on the section marked “IV” Inside you'll find an intravenous injection kit, which I'm sure you'll know it by the old Welsh word “cit mewnwythiennol.”
Vela reluctantly turned around and gently pressed a finger on the letters “IV” and waited. After a second or two, a small beep from somewhere overhead was heard, and the panel gently protruded from the wall. It didn't do anything else, so he reached up and pried it open. Inside, he found the “cit” and he pulled it out of the cabinet. He set to work, all the time listening carefully to Menkab's instructions, asking detailed questions as he went.
No comments:
Post a Comment