The characters that you can identify belong to Thomas Harris; they are used herein without permission, but in the spirit of admiration and respect. No infringement of copyright is intended and no profit whatsoever is intended.
Chapter 1
The Assignment
Once the FBI accepted the fact that Starling had not broken the law, and her only violation had been a failure to follow direct orders from her superior, they reinstated her to full duty with a mixture of reluctance and relief. Reluctance because they thought of her as a lose cannon and dreaded to face the repercussions of her often over-zealous behavior. Relief, because her exculpation saved the Bureau the embarrassing possibility of further negative publicity.
Once reinstated, they didn't know what to do with her, or how better to keep her from further embarrassing the Bureau.
Ultimately they assigned her to a witness protection case, where she spent twelve hours a day in a hospital room, sitting beside a terminally ill witness; and was relieved by a Marshall at the end of her shift. The Marshall, a man close to retirement with no interest in the job aside from reaching full pension; had no idea of Clarice's claim to fame, or her connection to the events that created headlines some month back. The anonymity suited her just fine.
In view of her pathetic status quo, she was rather surprised to be summoned to the office of the Director, in the seventh floor of the Edgar J Hover building.
She proceeded to Director Tunberry's office where she found him accompanied by two of his cronies, Assistant Director Noonan and her own boss of the record, Clint Pearsall .
All three men got up when she entered the room, and Tunberry came around his desk to greet her.
"Starling, come on in. You look well." He held out his hand, in what she considered a crappy attempt to make her feel at ease.
The other two contributed in turn with equally insincere greetings.
"Sit, please," the Director said, gesturing toward a softy cushioned armchair, while he went back behind his desk, sat, and addressed Clint Pearsall, who seemed determined to avoid making eye contact with Starling, which, in her estimation was not a good sign.
"Clint, do you want to do the honors, or should I?" Clarice had the funny feeling that the whole scene was rehearsed, and waited patiently for the performance, with her hands neatly folded on her lap.
"Maybe you should, Director Tunberry, you have all the facts necessary to answer Starling's questions, and I'm sure she'll ask plenty if she decides to accept the assignment."
Tunberry sighed softly, as if the weight of the world had been laid on his shoulders.
Clarice felt her contempt grow.
"OK, Starling, to begin with I must stress that what we are going to tell you must never leave this room; the same applies to the nature of the assignment that we are about to offer you. Whether you take it or not, complete secrecy is of outermost importance.
Can we have your word regarding the confidentiality of these matters?"
She nodded, "Yes sir!"
"I'll get to the point. Immediately following the unfortunate events at the Chesapeake, our lab managed to secure both viable DNA and tissue of Hannibal Lecter, mostly from the blood he lost in the kitchen and particles of tissue attached to the cleaver.
At the time, we decided to start a research project that, if successful, would add a whole new dimension to the science of criminal profiling.
For the purpose of applying genetic research to criminal profiling, we used all our most qualified human resources and borrowed the best technicians for several departments, including those under the Surgeon General, as well as laboratories and medical staff.
We managed to get a generous budget from the powers that be, and two weeks after my vague but effective proposal; the project was on the way.
Our actual plan was to clone the doctor and thus have an opportunity to analyze the clone from birth onward in an effort to find answers to the doctor's criminal behavior, the reason for his insanity, and most importantly the source of his outstanding intelligence."
Clarice Starling had difficulty comprehending the magnitude of what he was saying; she thought that if she understood correctly, and she thought she did, what the director was describing was, in fact, an abominable monstrosity.
Her mouth seemed to have a life of its own, and she couldn't suppress the question from spurting out,
"Excuse me sir, are you telling me that a cloning experiment is under way to produce a baby with Doctor Lecter's identical DNA makeup?"
"That is about right, Starling." He seemed rather pleased with her ability to grasp the facts, and looked at the other two as if saying, "I told you."
"Haven't cloning experiments been banned?" she could feel herself getting agitated at the immorality of the whole issue, at the violation of the Doctor's human rights, let alone those of the potential child.
"Indeed, they have, for private sectors; but we felt that experiments such as this one, conducted by a government agency in the name of scientific research could be justified. Unfortunately not everyone agrees. When the lid came off as a result of leak from one of the technicians, and those in High Places realized the entire nature of the project, they were up in arms, viewing it as political suicide. As a result we were ordered to discontinue the experiment at once, before the information leeks out to the press or the public, and we stand the risk to face public opinion on the matter.
As you know from personal experience both the press and the public are always condemning."
Dumbfounded,Clarice stared at him in silence.
He gave her an inquisitive look "You follow, so far?"
She nodded,
"Anyway," he went on, "the project is about to reach maturity, in other words, is fetus is ready for actual birth and we are faced with a direct order to destroy it before is born or allow it to be born only if we find the right person to care for him, to raise him, such as it is"
He paused as if expecting to hear a comment from her, but Clarice was too flabbergasted to speak, when she looked at him, her eyes fell on his name plate at the edge of his desk, it read Gabriel Tunberry. She realized that she didn't know his first name and found it ironically appropriate under the circumstances. She nodded, as if urging him to go on. He did.
"In short, Starling, we have to make him disappear, it would be unwise to kill, him. Yet, once he is born he will need a mother. As you can imagine, we can't just give him to Child Services to be adopted by an unsuspecting couple, as if he was a regular baby.
Tunberry spoke softly, his tone so ostensibly insincere, that Clarice wondered fleetingly about his overall credibility.
"Starling, you are the world's foremost expert in Hannibal Lecter, hence the most qualified to handle him from birth. It will be to everyone best interest if you accept the assignment and became his adoptive mother."
"You want me to raise a baby Hannibal Lecter?" she leaned forward as if to reach for understanding, the whole idea was preposterous.
"Precisely," said the director, while the other two expressed their own words of agreement.
Clarice Starling was certain that not all the cards were on the table, that they were showing her a loosely abridged version of the facts.
"How are you going to manage the paperwork, birth certificate, adoption paper, the works?" she was bargaining for time to set her thoughts in order. "I am not Child Services ideal adoptive parent, you know?"
The director momentarily avoided eye contact.
"The usual way, the child is due around 9 1/2 month after the night at the Chesapeake, ..." he fidgeted uncomfortably. "Well... time wise, he could be yours and Lecter's...technically, that is!" Director Tunberry blushed.
Clarice let the allegation fly over. She was certain that this was probably the fall-back plan from the start; the reason why they had kept her out of public view, tucked away in a hospital room with a terminally ill witness and a witless Marshall who didn't know his ass from his elbow. This was obviously the reason why they assigned Ardelia to a lengthy case in Los Angeles and she was not due back anytime soon.
The idea had been to keep her out of sight just in case they needed to make it appear as if she was pregnant... "How convenient!" she thought.
"So, he is going to pass as my naturally born child?"
"Exactly"
Suddenly it downed on her that "technically" the child was already hers, her Lamb, as the Doctor would remark. As for the infant; she was his only hope for survival.
"What are the plans for his future? Are you going to be looking constantly over our shoulders to see if he punches a bully in schoolyard or not?"
"For heavens sake, Starling" erupted Noonan, "the child is not even born yet. Let's take one step at a time?"
"I didn't get an answer, Mr Noonan," she said firmly, "Are you or aren't you going to be looking over my shoulder?"
"We are not. In fact don't want the child to be linked to us at all, and nobody plans to hurt him either, Starling; on the contrary, we want him cared for by a responsible individual, and you are perfect for the part; we are abandoning the project, once we place him in your arms he is yours and the whole project gets dismantled, the labs are being dismantled just as we speak. You decide his future; we wash our hands and be done with him" He seemed slightly weary, but not repentant for the entire fiasco.
She couldn't hold back any longer
"Well I just want you to be aware that if this is a ploy to get Lecter to resurface, you are sadly mistaken, because he, of all people knows that he couldn't have impregnated me."
Clint Pearsall spoke for the first time. "We wouldn't have spent such large amount of taxpayer's money just to draw out Lecter. In fact, the farther he is the fewer problems we are bound to have."
"We are up a creek here Starling; we need you in on this one. You are all we've got. Either you take him or he won't be born." Noonan illustrated in a dark tone, further emphasized by a sharp hand movement across his front from left to right
Clarice knew she was not going to let them annihilate this baby; but she wanted all her questions answered now, because she felt, correctly, that after the issue was settled these three will deny the existence of the entire incident.
"What prevents you from destroying him and let it go at that? I really have to understand what motive, aside from the research, prompts you to bring another Hannibal Lecter into this world?"
"We are not monsters, Starling." As soon as the words left his lips he saw the look on Clarice's eyes and sighed. "The truth is we are afraid to compound the blunder by destroying the fetus. In the worse case scenario that the press gets hold proof that the cloning occurred, then, the destruction of the fetus would add aggravation to injury; they'll crucify us. We are trying to avoid further compounding our mistakes."
She nodded, this explanation she understood, realizing that as usual, it was no moral issue, these people had no morals, they were just trying to save their asses, plain and simple.
"What job classification will I have to carry on this assignment?" As she spoke, she realized how stupid her words sounded, and recoiled, somewhat overwhelmed by the enormity of the commitment.
The room fell silent for a short beat.
"The project was assigned a hefty budget; a great deal of it has been spent. There are about 200 million left and we'll need about 50 million to dismantle. We have set entirely various untraceable accounts in foreign banks and are prepared to surrender two of them to you, for a total of one hundred and fifty million. As soon as we give you the details you can call the number, verify the amount, and change the password.
Clint Pearsall here is the expert on that. In anticipation, he already has an Austrian account already in place that he will hand over to you plus another more easily accessible one. Once Clint finishes that formality you'll be severing the last connection with us. Thus further guaranteeing your safety and that your child. Then you sign your resignation which we'll announce the day after you get the child."
"You want me to resign, and disappear?"
The silence that followed implied agreement. Then the Director nodded.
She was outraged and felt the insane urge to ask them why they didn't take the kid and the money and ran. But managed to control herself, because she didn't want to muddle up things.
"How much time do I have to think about it?"
"You don't, Starling, we need your answer now?" Tunberry spoke very softly and again, avoided eye contact.
A long silence followed, and then she whispered, "What do I tell Ardelia?"
"There is no need to explain anything. She is been gone for several month and we don't intent to bring her back any time soon." He chuckled a little sarcastically. "If you are so worried, you might consider paying your half of the rent until the end of the year, by the time she comes back she'd be able to find another roommate."
Clarice got the picture; they could to be pushed, but only so far.
"We've rented a house for you in Virginia, for the first three month after you take the child, it has a fully furnished a nursery," Noonan sounded friendlier now. "If the Tattler tries to reach you for comment regarding your resignation, they won't be able to find you."
"How much time do I have to prepare?"
"Mr Pearsall here will accompany you to several meetings at the Lab, and you'll get the baby the day after tomorrow.
You might want to pack and have your belongings ready, we'll send the movers to bring them to the house in Virginia, that way, you'll be able to go directly there after you pick up the infant. If you don't have time to pack everything, just leave instructions for the movers and they'll pack the rest for you."
For a second she conjured the image of Dr. Lecter, he never appeared as wholesome as he did now in comparison with the monstrosity displayed by these respectable high echelon law enforcers.
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Feedback is welcomed and encouraged. I'll be posting one chapter a week as I do the final proofread and rewrite.C