Nor All Your Tears

by Dark Mirage1

2013. Meet Breedlove's other protege, his more talented protege Lilith, as she breaks Adam out of prison to help her ectogenesis project...& an older Catherine Eckhart...a married Grey Eckhart...

Nor All Your Tears 240

NAYT1.doc

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ
Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.
-Edward Fitzgerald, The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

2013

Rebecca

"Mason, this is your birthday cake. You are going to have a piece, aren't you?"

I had just sliced generous slices of cake and handed them out to Emma, Dr Varady, and Jesse.

Mason allowed himself a smile. He could do that now, and not feel foolishly vulnerable in the company of those recognized as friends. Even now, his employees and most of his superiors had no suspicion this aspect of him existed. "A small slice, please. Whole food hasn't been agreeing with me."

"Laura would be crushed if you didn't have a piece. So would I after prying out of you that you wanted a chocolate cake with orange-peel frosting."

I sliced off a sliver of cake, making a mental note to talk to him later about his problems with digestion. This was something new. Such change could mean nothing or everything. I had to know. His health could not be taken for granted. I handed him his cake. "Happy birthday."

"Thank you."

Mason turned to Dr Varady. "Laura, it was thoughtful of you to do this."

"I enjoyed making it. It's unusual."

"One of my great-aunts –Great Aunt Natalie Grey—made a cake very like this when we visited her in Georgia. I must have been about seven; Marcus was still alive. I never forgot Natalie Grey's wonderful cake."

"Laura practices an art nearly lost outside of bakeries." I smiled. It was true.

"A fading art, but not quite dead," Dr Laura Varady began. "Emma's been stopping by for lessons. She's going to keep the art alive."

"It's really not hard, once you know the techniques. I think it's fun." Emma smiled. "And my friends are amazed. When Shalimar had a party to celebrate the opening of her third martial arts studio, she couldn't believe I made the cardamom cake myself."

Emma had come a long way. I liked her as soon as Mason introduced us. Emma was warm, genuine, and she had saved Mason's life, and in a sense, my own. To her innate qualities, she had added a degree in psychology and was well along on the way to a graduate degree.

"Speaking of keeping things alive…I know this is Mason's day, but Emma and I have news we want to share." Jesse was smiling broadly.

"Someone has stolen you away from Genomex with a huge salary offer?" Mason asked, smirking, and not completely in jest. "I'll match it and throw in a company car. You're invaluable to me."

Jesse had matured into Mason's ablest lieutenants. Mason never said as much to Jesse, but he confided to me that Jesse would have a significant role in the future operation of Genomex/GSA, possibly taking his position. Jesse's intelligence and unique understanding as a Genomex mutant himself made him uniquely suited to the job. I doubted Jesse would ever have Mason's singular dedication, but the main mission of Genomex no longer required such resolve and single-mindedness.

Jesse rolled his eyes, embarrassed by the lavish but sincere praise.

"No, nothing like that. Something better. In spite of everything we've done to prevent it, Emma and I are having a baby."

Laura Varady squealed with delight. "Can I be an honorary grandma? All of my grandchildren are out of state and I would love to fuss over this one!"

I hugged Emma. "I'm so happy for you both. You are so lucky."

"Honorary grandmas, aunties, --and uncles," Emma said, turning to Mason, "are welcome. Can anyone, especially a child, have too much love?"

I pushed the tragedy of two miscarriages from my mind. My happiness for Emma was sincere. My misfortunes were no reason to resent anyone else's joy. "Mason, I think we should celebrate with the non-alcoholic spumante, since Emma shouldn't be drinking ethanol now. I'm sure there's at least one chilled bottle."

Mason didn't seem to be focused on anything in the room. He looked stunned. His plastic fork rested on the paper plate, his mind briefly occupied elsewhere. I watched his eyes as he recovered from the surprise , and managed, just barely, a polite and proper, "Congratulations. To both of you."

"Are you having problems with the cake? You don't look well."

When I asked the question, I knew the cake was not the problem. He couldn't fool me. He was not pleased.

"I'll be fine. Don't worry." He set down the plate and went to retrieve faux spumante from refrigeration.

He could not fool Emma, either. She could sense his emotions, even if she could not read the subtleties on his face.

No, you are not fine. Can't fool me, Mason Grey Eckhart. What is it? Bad memories of my losing three of your children? You're not one to begrudge anyone else happiness. Why aren't you happy for Emma and Jesse? We're going to talk about this later.

"Laura, I don't know anything about taking care of a baby." Emma sounded overwhelmed.

"I raised five children and lived to tell about it. By the time this baby arrives, I will have you prepared."

Laura Varady possessed one of the most generous hearts I had known. Throughout the years of Mason's estrangement from humanity, she alone treated him well, never forgetting the man he had been before, and never abandoning hope he could be again.

I am fortunate to have such people filling my life.

Mason returned with a cold bottle; I retrieved glasses. "Boy or girl," I asked. "Do you know?"

"Girl," Emma replied, smiling.

"Does she have a name?" Dr Varady asked.

"Jessica. Jessica Anne Kilmartin."

"We don't know if 'Jesse' and 'Jessica' have any relationship, but we liked the way it sounded." Jesse was still smiling.

Emma remained perplexed by Mason's emotions. "It just happened, Mason. We were shocked."

Mason poured bubbly grape juice into her glass. "Life…holds many surprises."

Well, I was happy for them. I'd sort out the rest later. "I propose a toast to the newcomer. To Jessica Anne, all the best for her and her parents."

Lilith

I am Lilith. Dr Paul Breedlove created and gave life to many variations on the theme of humanity, some of them with hardly any human left. (Oh, yes, I know about the human/insect chimeras. Paul showed me the photos and films.) Some of his creations were much superior to the general type of human. But I am Lilith, and upon me Paul lavished years of attention and refinement because he loved me best of all.

There are those who condemn Paul as a once-upon-a-time member of the Nazi party. He was a party member, yes, I acknowledge that. Paul never believed their absurd racial theories. He laughed at the results of the Lebensborn program, almost all mediocrities, and at the inability of the Nazis to define 'Aryan' other than "we know it when we see it", all the while following into wrack and ruin a Fuhrer who did not fit the 'Aryan' ideal. Paul served the Nazi savages only because they provided funding and facilities for research, and because they took his genius seriously despite his youth.

Paul's dream was to create a superior human form. He knew, even at a young age that the best brilliance of humanity was scattered among individuals of all peoples.

When Paul crafted Adam Kane, his first synthetic human, he used only his own DNA as 'platform' for creation. The size of Breedlove's organization in the late 1950s limited the scope of possibilities.

By the time Paul shipped Adam off to Stanford, he had dabbled extensively into the creation of what later were known as Genomex mutants.

I think Paul must have been relieved to see the young Adam go off to fine-tune his mind. From the stories I heard, Adam was an unbearably arrogant child. He had a tendency to make playmates subservient to him, always letting them know how superior he was. How tiresome that must have been.

The early mutants were far from perfect. Quite often they had emotional or physical problems, and they were difficult to control. Like all Genomex mutants, they were prone to immunological problems.

So it was that Paul returned to the creation of a superior synthetic human. His organization was much expanded, and he recruited staff worldwide. Paul maintained DNA samples from nearly all of his employees. Some knew about this, and some did not. From this collection of brilliant minds, Paul Breedlove selected the very best from most of them, resulting in…me.

I may truly be said to be a child of Genomex, being the bearer of DNA from dozens of employees. Everything about me is superlative: intelligence (superior speed, memory, linear thought, creativity, three-dimensional thought) and physical constitution (superior resistance to disease, biomechanical efficiency, and ultimately, longevity) and my looks are a fusion of the faces of all those people. I have elements of most large racial groups in the world, but none predominate. I am assured the combination is highly unusual and attractive.

Since Adam turned out to be flamboyant and attention-craving, Paul crafted me to be modest and quiet, if I wished, capable of blending into any setting.

Adam could not admit, even to himself, that he was other than born human. Paul thought this very silly of Adam, but this quirk of Adam's was useful when he periodically stopped by Breedlove's office where Paul would download his memories of all work Adam had done or knowledge acquired, and later, upload all of these data into me! He did not do the reverse because Adam did not have that capability. Adam retained no memory of these downloads. This was useful, and continued until Adam left Genomex in 1998.

Paul could not upload his own memories, but I did have access to all of his laboratory notebooks, which I studied with great care.

Sometime after Eleanor died (In a sense, she was my mother since I was constructed from one of her eggs. Her mitochondria are my own.) we became lovers in 1992, which no doubt will strike some as incestuous or repulsive, or both, given that I was Paul's creation and not truly human. No matter. I did say I was his best-beloved. Fortunately, the Genomex gossip mill was absorbed with the strange transformation of Mason Eckhart, and paid no attention to Paul and me.

Paul's mutants were not successful, but it was years before he admitted they were a great failure and that his decision to continue making more and more of them was a mistake. At first, he tried to say that Adam had talked him into continuing experimentation, but I would have none of that!

"You worked with Adam too long! Don't make excuses the way he does."

Adam's idea of the 'truth' was always plastic and mutable. He believed no one else was smart enough to notice!

As reports increased about people who could only be Genomex mutants committing crimes and behaving destructively began to appear, Paul became more reflective about his mutants and more withdrawn from the daily running of Genomex.

Paul was a brilliant man, but his belief that his creations would prove harmless was delusional wishful thinking. Not only did these unfortunates have freakish talents, but hardly any of them understood what they possessed. Many of them had emotional problems arising from their inevitable distress. The seeds of Paul's great guilt were sown.

When Adam left Genomex without a parting word, Paul withdrew even further from the operation, delegating an ever-increasing number of responsibilities to Mason Eckhart. Despite Eckhart's peculiar combination of afflictions, he was a surprisingly effective executive. Not a charming one, but effective. Having the concerns of Genomex to distract him was a good thing; few humans I have known could have coped with the physical and emotional traumas Paul described Eckhart enduring.

Every autumn, Paul became depressed as the days shortened and winter approached. He did not like seeing everything wither and die, dry up and turn brown. I do not know why he did not locate Genomex in a warmer place; Eleanor must have wanted things this way.

In October 1999, Paul summoned Eckhart to his office and spent hours explaining the science to Eckhart, outlining what the existence of the Genomex mutants implied or the rest of humanity.

Paul knew what the mutants implied, and once Eckhart knew as well, Paul said he blew up, furious he had spent fifteen years of his life protecting an operation that would eventually lead to the extinction of humanity. He demanded to know what could be done to change the outcome.

"Short of rounding them all up, nothing," Paul told him.

Eckhart began collecting mutants immediately, no trivial undertaking since they were scattered and no one had kept track of them. Production and manufacture of stasis pods and subdermal governors by the dozens began. Paul turned a blind eye to this activity, guilt growing over the creation of mutants as more and more of them grew to adulthood, an adulthood likely to be brief.

Someone had to run Genomex, but I did not like the way Eckhart took over more and more of Paul's duties. Realistically, Paul left him little choice. When I complained about Eckhart's presumption, Paul asked me if I would prefer having Adam in charge, which put things into perspective.

Paul's guilt deepened over time. I became annoyed by the way he minimized his role in the project. In 2005, I learned he had prepared a first draft of a book detailing the mutant project from the late 1960s forward. He had not written an honest account, giving far too much credit to Eleanor and Adam. Being human and weak, I suppose he could not do otherwise.

"What do you intend to do with this?" I demanded.

"Find a publisher for it."

He was serious.

"If people believe you, there will be panic and chaos. In an age when learning has never been more convenient, ignorance is honored and the masses adopt the dress, speech and manners of the unlearned. Can you truly believe people will behave other than irrationally? Anyone who appears every so slightly different from the human norm will be murdered by unthinking mobs."

"Maybe. Maybe not. Perhaps people will just tune out the bad news."

"They might. But I think not: a lot of people will use such news as the perfect opportunity to rid themselves of enemies and rivals. Do you want to be responsible for a kind of kristallnacht?"

"I need to do something for all the unhappy lives I've created."

"It's a little late for that."

"I'll do what I can, Lili. There are many people out there who are suffering because they don't even know what they are."

Paul made no secret of his intention to reveal the Genomex projects to the general public. I could not dissuade him.

The individual most alarmed by Paul's plan was Eckhart. He bluntly told Paul how foolish his intentions were, within my hearing, reminding Paul how emotional people became about genetically engineered vegetables. Paul remained determined to make the information public.

Eckhart was intensely interested in this revelation. I could not imagine why, unless he believed his job would be eliminated. Even if no one with his job description was needed, Genomex at minimum owed him a livelihood after the debilitating onsite injuries he suffered and continued to endure. Eckhart displayed just a little too much interest in Paul's coming press statement. I watched him carefully, and knew he was thinking about more than Adam's crimes against him.

I had just left Paul to get a dinner for him when I heard agitated male voices behind me. I retraced my steps through the packed shelving, arriving in time to see Eckhart's man Thorne murder Paul and see Eckhart set fire to the area.

They never saw me.

The fire spread quickly, but if I made an audible sound, Thorne would come after me, so I waited until Eckhart and Thorne were safely gone before running out another exit, stopping only once, pulling a fire alarm.

Eckhart should have questioned how it was the alarm was turned in so quickly, but to my knowledge, he never did. He must have assumed an automatic alarm was activated. The accumulated hard-copy archives were completely destroyed nevertheless. Microfilmed copies of laboratory notebooks were of course stored elsewhere, in an unused salt mine beneath Lake Erie, but some interesting and incriminating material was lost forever. Or so I hoped.

I was frightened of Eckhart and Thorne. I packed what I really needed at Paul's –our—house, and drove to the airport, taking the next flight to a major hub. I didn't care where. The following day I phoned personnel and told a story about ailing relatives on Oahu, and booked a flight to Hawaii. In all my years at Genomex, I had never taken so much as a sick day, so I was believed.

I spent a day at an airport hotel in Honolulu, gathering my thoughts. Then I flew to LAX the next day, called some of my old professors and secured a new position. I never returned to Genomex.

Rebecca

A pair of steel doors sealed us safely away from the real world. Inside, air was passed through multiple filters, and positive pressure maintained so any leaks would result in air flowing outward, making the entry of viruses and bacteria spores less likely. When the suite of rooms was unoccupied, ultraviolet light bombarded most every square centimeter, another means of decreasing chances of infection.

With the doors shut behind us, we entered our own universe, secure enough to touch one another in our fashion. No one was here to find anything we did odd. We could hold one another close and tight, but with faces turned away from each other. Anyone who did not understand Mason's condition would think this peculiar.

We were never affectionate in front of ordinary employees. People get such strange ideas with so little evidence.

We did not owe Genomex employees an explanation of our relationship or the adjustments required by Mason's afflictions. 'Normal' people might find some of these things odd, but how many 'normal' people have friends like Jesse, routinely giving his blood to help keep Mason alive?

Other than his doctors, only Catherine knew Mason was regularly, intentionally inoculated with my gut flora to lessen the possibility my presence would make him ill.

"Thank you for the birthday party."

"You're welcome, as always."

"The cake was a surprise. A good one."

"Laura's a good friend. Mason, I watched your face tonight. You're not happy about Emma's pregnancy. Would you tell me about it?"

"I don't think Emma can have this child." He looked grave.

Not 'should' but 'can'. What are you thinking?

"Jessica Anne was a surprise to Emma, an accident. They're telling the truth about that. Emma was very careful."

"And you know this because?" he asked, with no suggestion of sarcasm.

"Women talk to each other about such things."

He accepted that. Some things would always be a mystery to him.

"Imagine a mutant who can walk through walls and hurl psionic blasts. Now, imagine the same individual emotionally unstable, criminal, malevolent, or all three."

"That's a grim vision," I said. "But perfectly possible. Still, I cannot imagine Emma and Jesse raising a dangerous child. I would think their daughter would turn out the opposite of all that."

"Much of our behavior is rooted in our genetics rather than upbringing. We've all seen it: the family of three or more children, good parents, all the children turn out well except one who is nothing like the others, the one who grows up useless or criminal or both. Nothing else explains this except genetics. Nurture affects us, but its effects are overrated."

What Mason said was true. Growing up, I knew a family with three children, all boys. The middle son was always in trouble. His brothers were, well, boys, and did ordinary boy-stuff, but this kid was a terror. One night he set fire to their house, destroying the garage and the room above it. His portrait probably hangs in post offices nationally.

"Unfortunately, you are correct."

"They could find themselves with a child neither of them could control. Ashlocke murdered his parents."

"There is still a chance Jessica Anne would be completely human."

"Most characteristics of Genomex mutants are inherited as simple dominant genes. The numbers do not favor a happy outcome."

"I know the numbers as well as you."

"If Emma and Jesse beat the odds, and tests show this child is completely human, I will be happy for them, and do nothing."

"And if tests show otherwise?"

"I will have to talk to Emma, and I will have to do something."

I didn't like tone of that. "What would you do?"

"I'm not sure yet. I'm still thinking about that."

"Emma and Jesse are our friends, Mason. Jesse's gives his blood to keep you alive. Handle this carefully."

"No matter how I handle this, the end result is unpleasant."

"What if we were discussing Catherine's pregnancy, not Emma's?" I asked.

"I would have the same attitude. Whatever else I am, you must by now know I am fair."

"Did you see their faces?"

"I did." He sighed.

"You cannot allow one mutant girl to be born, assuming the worst?"

"No. Not only would she be carrying dangerous genes, but I would be accused of making an exception for friends. Which would be true."

"They both want this child very much."

"However, their wishes are outweighed by the consequences for the rest of us. I hoped this kind of gut-wrenching duty was behind me."

He was sad, sad as I had not seen him since the day he believed Catherine betrayed him to Adam.

"So did I."

"Before I do anything, I will review Emma's medical exam. If they're lucky, I won't have to do anything. Rebecca, I haven't had to do anything…distasteful in years. I don't know if I still have the resolve, and I don't know if you will understand if I need to act."

"We'll hope the child is Plain Vanilla Human."

Who among his enemies, or even among his small circle of friends, would believe Mason, tormented with guilt over past sins, and the necessity of committing future sins?

He wasn't a nice man. He never claimed to be one, but he did have a conscience, as complicated as the rest of him.

"Are you losing weight?" I asked. I pushed back from Mason, and looked at him. "I seem to be holding less of you."

"I'm having a lot of difficulty keep down ordinary food. I've mostly gone back to the pink slurry."

"Have you talked to Dr Prodana?"

"I haven't. I should."

"Yes. Tomorrow? Please." Nagging him would do no good. A single emphatic plea registered as strongly as a dozen nagging reminders.

"I don't like her."

"No one seems to. Don't renew her contract. But you need to talk to her."

"I've had legal looking into ways to break that contract."

"Good. I didn't think you had access to medical records at St Kat's."

"I have access to everything."

"That sounds illegal." I smirked. Much of what Mason routinely did as his duties was illegal.

"It is illegal. But I do it anyway since it is useful. I told you a long time ago I wasn't a nice man."

"I didn't forget." I smiled.

Mason

"O Dear God," I said, setting down the phone.

"What did Catherine say to you?"

Rebecca had not anticipated this response from me.

"She wants to bring a significant guest named Patrick Guyton."

"Oh. And you said?"

"Yes. I want to get a good look at him."

"I expect you would."

Given my unhappy history, I wanted to spare Catherine as much heartbreak as possible. Completely sparing her pain was impossible and unreasonable, and probably not good for her. All she would tell me about Patrick was that he was very smart and very good looking.

Minutes later, I was intently compiling every scrap of information I could find about the exalted Patrick and his family. What I found was surprising.

"Rebecca, this Guyton clan is filthy, stinking wealthy. Not merely well off, but awash in cash, land, and valuables. The catalogue of paintings they are presently loaning to various museums is staggering."

"Where did they get their money?"

"It wasn't a Guyton who made the fortune. The money comes from Patrick's mother. Eric Guyton worked for her father about five years before marrying his only child. The mother's money goes back to a nineteenth century industrial robber baron type, except that the family diversified their holdings throughout the twentieth century."

"Did you find anything scary?"

"This tribe is remarkably scandal-free. Mostly they seem to have quietly added to the family fortune, or quietly spent it on paintings."

"Making them either of good character, or lacking imagination." Rebecca grinned.

I rolled my eyes at her. But she was correct. She usually was.

Rebecca

Mason's lackeys –it's hard to think of them in any other way, since they rarely spoke, dressed like they shopped together, and were difficult to tell apart even though they came in a variety of heights and colors—knew better than to disturb his sleep for any reason other than the profoundly dreadful. When the GSA phone rang in the middle of the night, the news was never good. I listened to Mason's half of the conversation and did not need to see his face to know his alarm.

"You'll have edited video for me in five minutes or shorter? I'll be waiting."

Mason terminated his end of the conversation, and sighed in the darkness. "You're awake, I suppose?"

"That phone always wakes me."

Mason turned on the tv, and set it to one of the GSA encrypted channels, showing nothing but color bars at the moment.

"Adam just never goes away. Someone stormed the prison with a gunship helicopter, and got Adam out in the process."

"A gunship helicopter? Not the kind of thing you rent by the hour at your local general aviation airport."

"No. This required planning, money, and connections. The 'connections' aspect bothers me most."

"Christina?"

"Perhaps, but Christina in recent years has been less than stable emotionally, to put it mildly. Her responsibilities and access have been cut back drastically." He paused. "Eleven men were killed so that Adam could once again walk in the world."

"This is someone or a group of someones to whom human life means nothing."

"I'm glad I'm not responsible for hunting Adam. Sooner or later, though, he'll be back here. He always comes back. He's never done with me."

Mason looked haggard and exhausted in the dim glow of the tv screen. I didn't like it. With Adam locked away behind steel, stone, and razor wire, Mason had not brought up his name in months. I hoped this 'demon' was exorcised. Now, Adam was back, raised up from hell.

The color bars were replaced with a brief screen listing the place, date, and time, and then switched immediately to digital views of the attack. Some of the video came from cameras destroyed moments later.

It looked like a movie but it wasn't. The gunship blasted three visible guard towers to rubble.

"The men who died were in those towers or underneath them."

Real, individual lives destroyed, all for Adam. Towards the end, few cameras continued to function, but one, controlled by an operator not even present at the prison but at Genomex, closed in upon Adam when he first appeared, until he was helped inside the helicopter by a woman. Her face was briefly, but clearly focused for a moment. Once they were both safely inside, the helicopter rose above the rubble, and sped off into the darkness.

"They must have been tracked."

"The pilot stayed too low for radar. Satellite images are being downloaded and searched for the right heat signature, but that will take a little time."

"Go back to the part where we can see the woman."

"What are you looking for?"

"I want to see her face."

Mason reversed, then advanced the images slowly.

"Mason, I think I know her…yes, and so do you."

"I do?" He was puzzled.

"Dr Lili Chen."

He froze the moving images. "That could be her. Another one of Breedlove's protégés. Very quiet, very subdued. I don't remember too much more about her."

"You wouldn't. She was a hard worker, and kept to herself. She had a lab across from mine for several years. I don't think she even stopped working for lunch."

Mason looked my way. Suddenly, I had a good idea what he was thinking. "Perhaps she did not need to eat." He smiled. "Time to do some research on the quiet, subdued Dr Chen."

Mason was off and running. He pulled on a heavy robe and padded off to a computer. I was unlikely to fall back asleep before knowing what he found, so I drew on my robe and followed him.

"Her full name is Lilith Eleanor Chen."

Eleanor was the name of Paul Breedlove's wife, Dr Eleanor Singer.

"Lilith?" I asked.

"Should that be meaningful to me?"

"In one of the more arcane Jewish folktales, Lilith is Adam's first wife, before Eve. Lilith left him."

"That sounds like Paul. I think we've found Breedlove's second android."

Lilith

When I hauled Adam up into the helicopter, he registered surprise at my strength, but said nothing.

"Buckle in. We're going for a wild ride."

I strapped myself in snugly. The treetop—and lower—ride in was more an adventure than I anticipated, but my pilots were more than equal to the task. After all, I had trained them.

"You took your time getting me out, Lili."

You're welcome, Adam.

"Conditions had to be perfect. Waiting for just the right combination of clear, moonless night with calm winds took a little time. Getting you out would have been pointless if we had to fly high enough for radar to find us or a gust of wind blew us into power lines."

"I've wasted months inside that cage. You can tell me know who organized this. Christina?"

"Christina? Christina's been such an emotional loon the last five years she's fortunate she hasn't been forced to retire. That she has a desk job sifting human intelligence is an act of charity."

Adam's old girlfriends were a puzzling lot, tending towards the emotionally unpredictable. Perhaps they made Adam feel stable. Working with the highly strung, anorexic Christina had made me tense and lose weight.

"Who, then?"

One weakness of Adam's intellect was a tendency to underestimate the people around him, especially the women. I wondered how he had come by that curiously quaint prejudice, raised as he was by Dr Eleanor Singer, a genius in her own right. Odd.

"This is all my doing, Adam."

"You?"

"Adam, appearing reserved and quiet has certain advantages. No one considers you capable of engineering prison breaks. It's great camouflage. Hiding in plain sight is always best."

Adam laughed. At me, not with me.

"Humility and reserve are not bad things. Sometime, you could try them."

"Where are we going?" he asked, changing the subject.

"Someplace familiar. I think you will be surprised."

"Someplace safe from federal authorities?"

"Oh, very safe."

Shortly after, we disposed of the helicopter. What a waste. I would have liked to keep it. Fast and powerful, I could have found many uses for it, but leaving a confused, broken trail was more important.

I sent my pilots and crew off in a fleet of unremarkable looking cars and pickup trucks, leading Adam to the last vehicle in a line.

"We're traveling in that?" Adam pointed with alarm towards the dented, rusted SUV with missing wheel covers.

I chuckled. Adam's idea of subdued transportation used to be a Porsche. "Not exactly the image of a getaway car, is it? Clunky, shabby—makes you wonder how good the brakes are, doesn't it?"

I unlocked and opened a door, gesturing for Adam to get in.

"And the seats are torn up. Did someone pay you to take this away, Lili?"

"Get in, Adam."

He did so, slowly. I unlocked the driver's side door and buckled in. "Be comforted by your own misleading impressions. This is a very special custom vehicle. The exterior is genuine junk, as are the seats and the dried-up, cracked vinyl on the dashboard. Most everything else is new, top quality, and heavy duty. The engine has enough wear to be broken in, but no more. Relax, knowing no one will mistake this heap as the means for your escape." I turned the key in the ignition. "When will we learn to look past appearances?"

"Clever. You gave this a lot of thought."

Is that all you can say? Of course it is. You're Adam Kane. More surprises are waiting, Adam Kane.

We drove off into the darkness.

"What's this?" Adam asked as I turned off the highway onto a deeply rutted dirt road.

"Home at last, Adam."

"This looks familiar."

"As well it should."

Emerging from the shabby SUV into the very early morning darkness, Adam was at once puzzled and pleased.

"But isn't Sanctuary one of the first places the feds will go looking for me?"

"That sounds reasonable, but I would not worry about it."

I opened a hinged, 3 inch square steel cover, and pressed my right thumb onto the sensor, releasing the exterior door.

"I don't recognize this entrance. You cut a new one into the mountain?"

"You'll see." I laughed.

Adam followed me down through the shaft until we emerged a few feet from the meditation pool. The lighting was balanced to approximate that of daylight. Brightly colored koi flashed through the water.

"You've deepened the pool to accommodate fish. I like that. I'll keep that." Adam took in everything. "You've done a remarkable job, restoring Sanctuary after the flooding. Really quite remarkable. Thank you."

"No thanks required."

"What happened to the labs?"

"They're there. The walls are simply solid, not glass."

"I'm ready to take up my work again. Where are you going to go?"

"I'm not going anywhere. This is my home."

"This is Sanctuary. I built it. It's my home."

"No, Adam. You are mistaken. This is Haven, my home, which I built."

"Haven?"

"Yes. Paul programmed us both to construct strongholds deep in vast piles of rock. The plans were identical, except I had the good sense to choose a pile of rock without a subterranean river. Haven will not flood, unlike Sanctuary."

"Programmed…"

"Yes. Haven and Sanctuary are Paul Breedlove's doing."

"I didn't design Sanctuary?"

"No more than I designed Haven. Adam, my research is making extraordinary demands upon my time. I broke you out of prison so that I could offer you a position as my assistant."

I tried to sound casual, but I had been waiting for this moment. I paused to allow "assistant" to seep through his brain cells, then continued on in my best professional voice.

"I believe you will find the work here to be unusual and challenging, and that you could play a most important role."

"You broke me out to be your assistant?"

"Yes. That has to be better than prison."

What choice had I given him? None at all! The wider world had no place for him, but I did.

"Looks like I'm staying on."

I knew you would be rational about this. You have nowhere else to go. All of your buddies, all of your former girlfriends are being carefully watched. As I will need to carefully watch you.

Adam presented himself to the world as a high-minded idealist, his pure research diverted to unsuspected and sinister applications. Nonsense. Adam had been enmeshed in the darker business of Genomex from the time he left Stanford.

Not only was he capable of telling the Big Lie. He was capable of murder. Paul told me what he tried with Mason Eckhart. I would be careful to never turn my back on Adam.

Rebecca

There are people who elicit immediate dislike, a handful of individuals whose nature is obvious, and obviously antagonistic to our own. No matter what these individuals say or do ever after, one knows the best to be hoped for is a strained politeness.

I disliked Patrick Guyton the first time I saw him. It wasn't just the sloppy clothes, which I recognized as actually expensive and considered stylish in some circles. He had given much thought to attain this look, or he slavishly copied some exemplar.

The sloppy clothes were annoying, considering that he was coming here to meet Catherine's father, ordinarily a circumstance in which one wanted to leave a positive impression. What really irritated me was his look of disdain, as if he had just scented something foul. I watched him through the glass as he pointed out to Catherine his disapproval of what he saw on the grounds.

In Patrick's world, only he matters. He is an individual who has never respected anyone else, and cannot imagine respecting anyone else. How many minutes before he and Mason are clawing one another's eyes out? What are you thinking, Catherine? Are you thinking?

Patrick entered through the double doors. I mentally noted his failure to hold the heavy –bulletproof glass—door for Catherine, which nearly smashed into her face. Patrick always comes first.

Summoning all my willpower, I managed to smile at Catherine.

"Welcome home, Catherine." I was glad to see her. She had blossomed into an intellectually gifted young woman of great promise, but she wouldn't go far with an anchor like Patrick in tow.

"Patrick, this is my not-evil stepmother, Dr Rebecca Steyn."

Catherine always introduced me that way. We both found it amusing because no one expected it.

I held out my hand in greeting, but either Patrick wasn't focused on me or he was intentionally snubbing me. He wasn't even looking my way.

"Do you do much animal testing around here?"

"None, unless you count the work with microorganisms. Research at Genomex has always been directed towards human genetics."

Catherine quietly signed in, and clipped on her personal badge. She turned to Patrick, visitor's badge in hand.

"Pat, you have to wear a badge. Everyone here has one."

"I don't want to wear one of those things, like a criminal."

Hmm, this could be amusing.

I smiled my corporate-pleasant smile, a not particularly friendly or sincere expression, akin to Mason's shark-eye glare in spirit and intent, just nowhere near as intense or obvious in malevolence. "Patrick, once through those steel doors, any heat signature detected without a valid badge alerts security. Some well-armed men will make your acquaintance in less than thirty seconds. They are painstakingly recruited for their lack of humor. Of course, you don't need to wear a badge, but you're not passing those doors without one."

Patrick swore, and shuffled up to the receptionist, where Catherine gave him a badge.

Swearing in front of the not-evil stepmother at first meeting. Bad, bad, bad.

"Mason's waiting for us in his office." I caught a glimpse of Catherine rolling her eyes. Mason could have met us in the informal 'family room', but no matter what he eventually thought of Patrick Guyton, initially he wanted to intimidate him. Mason always tried to maintain whatever advantage was available. Catherine understood perfectly what Mason was doing and why.

Mason's office had been designed to intimidate. Before it was constructed, he had Dr Varady find psychologists who could tell what colors, textures, and materials would make people ill at ease and maximize the shock of his own…unusual appearance. Everyone was uncomfortable entering this sanctum sanctorum at first; I was accustomed to it and so was Catherine. For most others, however, every visit to Mason's office was a tense, sweaty-palm experience, especially during their initial visit. Mason wanted things that way.

Patrick Guyton swept into Mason's office, oblivious to the setting as if he was no more aware than a turnip.

Mason looked up from his desk, glancing briefly my way. I caught his eye briefly and rolled my eyes to warn him about this turnip.

"Welcome home, Catherine." Mason would never admit it out loud, but his youngest daughter was clearly his favorite.

"Mason, this is Patrick Guyton."

As pleased as he was to see Catherine, I could tell Mason was annoyed because he remained rooted in his chair and did not offer a gloved hand for shaking. Patrick may have been oblivious of it, but Catherine surely recognized the slight. I turned to study Patrick, and was surprised to find him not looking Mason's way at all, but instead taking in the minutiae of the office.

Patrick sagged down into a chair. "This place looks like a real bastion of capitalism."

Mason stared for a moment in disbelief.

"Genomex is a bastion of a good many things, Mr Guyton."

"Or my great-aunt Lucinda's loft in New York. Her take on modern décor could double as the set for a tv starship, too."

Mason was at the edge of unrestrained anger. He would require little more prompting to unleash a verbal attack. Only my presence and Catherine's was holding him back now.

An awkward silence followed, awkward for Catherine, anyway. His comment had no effect upon Patrick. I knew what Mason was doing, or attempting. Most people found silences with Mason more distressing than his sarcasm because they couldn't imagine what he was thinking. Patrick should have had the sense to be uncomfortable. Catherine was perturbed but her distress was misplaced.

I took a chair on the right with Catherine in the middle. This could not be pleasant for her.

"Catherine's said a good deal about you, but she's never mentioned your major. You have declared a major, yes?"

"Sociology. I am specializing in the study of the oppression of workers."

Mason was not easily caught unprepared; he'd seen and heard too much. He was staring at Patrick in undisguised disbelief.

"Oppression?"

"There are millions and millions of workers who must work at jobs they hate for less money than they want."

"The world has legions of people who are not particularly intelligent or diligent. They are the ones who tend to drift towards the base of the social pyramid."

"But that is not fair."

"Frequently, there is no other place for such people."

Mason emphasized this last point with a steady shark-eye glare. I'd seen grown men and women terrorized with that look. I was astonished to see Patrick meet Mason's glare with defiance.

However misguided, he does believe that he says. What a pain.

"I also want to save endangered animals."

"All of that sounds very noble." Mason could be frightening when he smirked. This was such an occasion. That look triggered terror in anyone with sense. Mason had a rare touch with sarcasm. Patrick didn't pick up on it at all. He'd be lucky to get out of Genomex alive.

"We humans have spread all over the planet, pillaging irreplaceable resources, cutting down the trees, killing the animals, and for what? Ourselves."

"And who should we be acting for?"

"We should live in harmony with the earth, not destroy it."

"The air is cleaner now than it was fifty years ago. So are the rivers."

Patrick shook his head. "Figures don't lie but liars can figure."

"I was there. I remember the filthy orange skies blanketing industrial zones. One never sees that now."

"People need to develop the habit of thinking hundreds of years into the future, not just the end of the next quarter."

Patrick must have intended that as kill-shot to the corporate creature he mistook Mason to be. If anyone thinks about the long-term future, it's Mason.

"We should be caretakers to the earth, not consumers!"

"Do you know what happens to most 'recycled' paper in this country?"

"It's remanufactured."

"No. There isn't a market for most of it. Some of it is stored and the balance goes into landfills."

I don't think Patrick believed him.

There was more awkward silence as Mason's anger built, all while Patrick sat serene and secure in his belief that he was an extraordinary being, attuned to the earth, high-minded, insightful, battling with an Evil Captain of Corporate Greed.

I hoped Patrick would learn sooner rather than later that much of what he believed was not rooted in fact or science, but was a simplistic fairy tale filled with drama and short on fact.

Mason was not used to anyone arguing such foolishness with him.

"Why don't we go on down to dinner?" I said, losing patience with the silence.

Mason stood up. "Yes, let's."

The route to the 'family room' led past several laboratories. Many of the labs had glass walls, giving the windowless space an airy, less claustrophobic atmosphere. The abundant glass also allowed anyone casually walking past to see exactly what was going on.

I had seen these sights for years, and thought nothing much of a particle size analyzer, or a colony counter, or any number of pieces of useful equipment. I had forgotten how arcane, even forbidding, instrumentation could look to people unfamiliar with lab work.

Patrick studied each lab with meticulous care.

What is he expecting to see? Dr Frankenstein's Tesla coils? Our Dr Frankenstein has been gone for many years.

Briefly, the mental image flitted through my mind of the residents of the neighborhood surrounding the facility, carrying torches and pitchforks, threatening the dwellers within. I imaged Dr Breedlove in lederhosen, appearing on a balcony (does Genomex have any balconies?) successfully imploring the (easily gulled) peasants that there was no cause for alarm, and that they should all return to their homes in peace.

"Are you sure you don't do any animal testing here?"

"Quite sure," I replied.

"I've always read that places like this grab stray dogs and do horrible experiments on them."

"That's an urban myth that won't die. The truth is less sensational. Organizations having no alternative but to perform animal testing use only animals specially bred for research purposes so that their test subjects will have a known genetic background and a known medical history. To do otherwise would invalidate the results of their experiments. That said, I could not be involved in animal work, although I did guillotine a white rat as an undergraduate in a biochemistry lab. The guys were too squeamish to behead the beast."

I caught Mason off-balance with that footnote. He probably never thought of me as the kind of woman who beheads small animals.

"Mr Guyton, I have worked here since 1984, and while some unique work was performed upon human subjects, our focus is upon human genetics and never did encompass animal experimentation."

"I think that even single-celled organisms have rights," Patrick declared, very much puffed up with his own moral superiority and deep wisdom.

"Like the amoeba that causes dysentery?" Mason asked.

"Yeah. Life is sacred."

"Mr Guyton, do you understand that human deaths in the millions each year are caused by waterborne single-celled organisms? Do you oppose procedures to make water safe for drinking by filtration, chlorination, and such?"

"It's selfish and unethical. We should live naturally, in harmony with nature, not beating nature into submission."

"A serious bout of diarrhea might just change your mind."

"I don't think so."

I could go dip a cup of water out of the lake and you could put that comment to the test, Patrick. I'd even filter out the big chunks before expecting you to drink it.

The thought was tempting, but based upon what I had seen out of Patrick, he might just agree to do it, just to annoy Mason, and then he would likely die. Catherine would hate me forever. Thinking about the possibility was enjoyable, however.

The pit Patrick had dug for himself was so deep I could not imagine him ever crawling out of it. I decided to settle into the spirit of the evening –absurdity— enjoy it as human drama, and try to rein in Mason if that became necessary.

The exterior doors of the 'family room' were, as always, guarded by GS agents. Before the kitchen staff brought up dinner, several agents searched the suite, and brought the cart inside. Mason did not like his dinners disturbed. I was accustomed to their presence, and had not thought of warning Patrick about them.

"What kind of place is this?" The sight of the armed GS agents had spooked him.

"With annoying frequency, unwanted visitors stop by. These fellows are part of the Genomex welcome."

Nicely done, Mason!

"I don't like guns."

"I do. So does Rebecca. She's a dead shot. We're both packing." Mason smirked at Patrick, who was more out of his depth than he knew. I opened my jacket to show off my automatic.

Patrick's eyes went wide at the sight of the demonic devices.

"I believe in gun control."

How predictable. I found myself disappointed by Patrick's easily anticipated attitudes.

"So do I. So does Rebecca. We practice regularly so we can hit the target center…every time. Except to be more accurate, the targets we use have a human form printed on them and my people are trained to aim for the upper part of the body…to kill."

"They don't try to wound?"

"Certainly not. I like my people to come back alive. Shooting to wound is a television myth. If someone is threatening you with harm or death, you want to stop them, completely. You cannot assume you are dealing with another rational being."

Mason was toying with Patrick. GS agents rarely used their weapons save in practice. However, it was true they were trained to kill, as indeed I was.

Patrick was speechless. I did not think that was possible.

We entered the family room. Everything required came on the cart: a fresh tablecloth, silverware, dishes, glasses, and of course, the meal.

The three of us—Mason, Catherine, and me, had a routine of setting up the table together and we fell into that practice without discussion.

"Don't you have someone to do this for you?" Patrick asked.

I thought Mason might spear Patrick with one of the forks he was setting out, but he only looked up and replied, "No, we do not, for reasons of security. Kitchen staff tends to turn over rapidly, and I am less sure of the new hires there than I am of the men outside. Or, if you prefer, you can think of what we are doing as liberating a few of the world's oppressed workers."

Patrick looked puzzled.

We sat down to dinner, which continued in the same vein as earlier conversation. Patrick didn't understand Mason's dry humor. Worse, he made such a convenient target of himself that he begged for ridicule. I realized Mason was restraining his talent for verbally shredding people who annoyed him. Patrick did not present enough of a challenge for him to unleash his best.

Mason relished pulverizing people he considered fools, but belaboring the same point over and over he did not indulge, probably in the belief that Patrick would provide many later opportunities.

Sitting down to table, for a moment I wondered if Patrick the paragon was some flavor of vegetarian. Allergies and other medical conditions were understandable, as were religious practices. However, people with fussy eating habits tested my patience. I once knew a woman who would eat only one vegetable dish in the world: peas with pearl onions. I expected Patrick to be a picky eater, but he surprised me by being voracious. Did he perhaps have intestinal parasites? Nothing would surprise me.

Mason smiled very nearly his most wicked smile as he lifted the cover from one of the main course dishes.

"Chicken!" he smirked. He knew what he was doing.

"Is it free-range or factory chicken?"

"I have no idea. I did not know the fowl personally."

"Free-range chickens are happier chickens. Factory-produced birds lead short, unhappy lives wedged into a cage so confining they cannot move. They cannot live the proper life of a chicken."

"And the proper life of a chicken is?"

"Flapping its wings. Scratching in dirt. Eating bugs. Perching in trees."

"Being consumed by hawks and foxes," Mason smirked.

"But while the chicken was alive, it would have been a happy chicken."

"I've never agonized over the psyches of the animals I consume. Birds are woefully stupid animals. Their brains are quite primitive."

"But they're living things!"

"Far simpler than a goat or cow, or even a rat. Have you ever studied brain physiology?"

"No."

"Fascinating study. I'm no scientist, but I've read about these things. No, birds cannot reflect or ponder. Being in that cage, with food delivered automatically to each bird, with no arguments over who eats first may just be a chicken's notion of utopia."

"Somehow, I don't think it is."

Mason passed a bowl of corn. "Good old maize."

"Organically grown?"

"I doubt it. Sharecropping with the insects is not as spiritual as you might think."

"Genetically modified?"

"Most likely."

"How can you eat it?"

"With a fork." Mason brandished a fork, then passed a couple of other dishes.

He took small portions of everything. That worried me. He then removed from the cart a bottle of his pink slurry, and poured most of that into a glass. I knew he was having a bad day with whole foods. What he put on his plate was hardly touched.

Patrick stared at the thick pink slurry as Mason emptied it into a water goblet.

"You've noticed my 'milkshake'. More than twenty years ago I was injured onsite. I have never been the same. My ability to digest whole food varies from day to day. For a long while I was fed intravenously, until my doctors found someone to process these 'milkshakes'. They appear more appetizing than they are."

Catherine and I were accustomed to Mason consuming his slurry. Patrick was quite struck by it. If he kept staring, Mason would probably offer him a glass. Perhaps he had never been in the company of anyone as debilitated as Mason. Perhaps he might now ponder more than the mental health of chickens.

"I understand your family has an extensive collection of paintings."

"We have quite a few."

"I've never cared for anything less realistic than the Impressionists. The resurgence of appreciation of nineteenth century realists such as Waterhouse and Leighton could not come too soon."

Patrick looked at Mason blankly. "The Romantics?"

"Especially those works dealing with subjects mythological or the Matter of Britain."

I suppose in Patrick's universe corporate pirates did not know about such things.

Mason's full of surprises, Young Turnip.

"I appreciate the way subjects are painted with painstaking realism, but often the effects of light are unusual or exaggerated."

Mason was no expert, and knew it, but what he did know exceeded the typical degreed individuals of the day. In Patrick's universe, it was accepted that men who carried (and liked) guns 1) retained fewer than five teeth in their head 2) were incredibly stupid 3) illiterate 4) tended towards pickup trucks and bib overalls and 5) adored NASCAR racing.

I looked across the table at Mason and tried to imagine him in bib overalls, beer can in hand, driving a rusty red pickup truck with the Stars and Bars in the back window. No. Never. Although he does have one of General Gray's flags, framed and sealed under nitrogen.

"But my preferences in music tend toward the baroque."

Patrick remained silent, although Mason had allowed him ample opportunity to make comments. The fact that no comments were being made was telling, a point made for Catherine's benefit. Patrick's erudition was more a pose than reality.

"I'm not much interested in art."

"In some segments of society such an interest is regarded as unmanly and sissified. But I learned if I could accurately sketch a subject, in great detail, it could serve as a two-dimensional analogue to building a model. This kind of exercise also trains the mind to carefully observe."

"That's what photographs are for."

"No. Even to use photographs properly, the eye must be trained to observe."

I don't think Patrick was accustomed to being contradicted so often and effectively.

Without Patrick being any the wiser, Mason had interrogated him over dinner.

"Perhaps after dinner we could take a walk around the facility. There is a well-groomed trail many employees use at lunch." I knew Mason was going to need to unwind after this meal.

"What are your plans for this summer? I could get you a place on the grounds crew here. It's a good way for students to earn money."

Mason knew exactly what he was doing when he made the offer.

"I will be spending the summer in the Ozarks with the Saviors of the Beasts, raising the awareness of the locals to the plight of the Scaly-Backed Red-Eyed Toad."

I almost choked on my spumante. Patrick was serious. I struggled not to laugh.

"Toads are among the world's oppressed," Mason said, with no less seriousness, but I knew how sarcastic he was being, and so did Catherine, who glared at her father. Patrick had no idea he was being ridiculed.

"Tell us more of the Ways of the Toad."

Mason

Safely behind steel doors, I felt free to hold nothing back. Even the brisk stroll around the outer perimeter of Genomex had not calmed my nerves. I leaned against the interior door, closed my eyes, and groaned.

"Oh Dear God!"

"The Turnip impressed you?"

Rebecca did have a way with words. I followed her to the sofa. She wrapped herself in a blanket kept folded on the arm, and sat down at one end. She keyed in Walton's Variation on a Theme of Hindemith, convoluted music at the end of a convoluted evening. I stretch out the length of the sofa, head in her lap. I removed my glasses and rubbed my eyes.

"Turnip. I like that. He must go through a lot of shoes. Did you notice the way he drags his feet? Why doesn't he pick up his feet?"

"Because he doesn't care about much besides toads. He's never had to be in a hurry to do anything. He can take his time. He thinks life will wait for him. So far, it has."

"What is Catherine thinking? You were a girl once."

Rebecca tilted her head, and narrowed her eyes. "Careful." She was being playful, but she wasn't pleased. It wouldn't have bothered me had someone said, 'You were a boy once…' but the matter did not merit exploration.

"You know what I meant. The turnip…"

"I thought about that all through dinner, and I think I know. You will not like it."

"Please. Share your insights. I am vexed and perplexed."

"Mentally subtract the shuffling feet, toss in greater intelligence, keep in mind the fervent beliefs, however misguided, the rampant ego, and who do you have as an undergraduate?"

"Adam."

"Correct. Imagine Adam at Stanford, nearly ten years younger than most classmates, and not letting any of them forget it for a moment. Stir in that special spicy blend of sanctimonious arrogance, and you've got the young Adam."

"Why Adam?"

"She grew up wanting Adam to be her father. Everything she heard about him, she used to construct an ideal. What she thinks of Adam now does not matter. The ideal she built in her mind remained lodged there."

Rebecca was right.

"Do you think this could be worse than having Mulwray as a son-in-law?"

"I think it's about even. With Patrick, you have to listen to concerns about the emotional well-being of poultry. With Mulwray, you'd always wonder if your Christmas present was hot."

"True. When you took your DVD player in for service, the serial number would betray its origins in the Midnight Market. What am I going to do, Rebecca?"

"To begin with, back off a bit with the sarcasm. For one thing, it's completely wasted on Patrick. He just doesn't get it. It's not that he's stupid, he just cannot imagine anyone poking fun at him. He's been sheltered and always taken seriously by adults, most of whom were themselves sheltered and removed from the rough and tumble of real life."

"You are asking a great deal of me."

Rebecca smiled. "He makes such an irresistible target, as if he had a bull's eye on his forehead."

"Saviors of the Beasts…" I lingered over each word.

Rebecca giggled. "He has no idea how silly he sounds. There's another reason not to undermine him too aggressively. Catherine will feel compelled to defend him if you're too obvious or thorough. Patrick may not understand your sarcasm, but she does."

"She will, won't she?" I should have realized that.

"She will, and you don't want to drive her towards him. Allow Patrick to twist his own rope and hang himself with it. With any luck, he'll even build his own gallows."

Rebecca smiled. What she said made perfect sense.

"Oppressed workers…he sounds like a throwback to the 1960s or 1930s. He probably has a portrait of Chef Guevara in his room. I wonder if he whistles the 'Internationale' to himself?"

"Mason, why do well-off families frequently breed leftist loons?"

"It's complicated. I never understood such people until I read Sowell's classic Vision of the Anointed. It comes down to thinking well of oneself for believing so many presumably noble, lofty ideas."

" 'I feel badly about the Oppressed and I am Concerned about Obscure Toads, while you, Miserable Insensitive, are not, so I am Vastly Superior.' These people often live incredible contradictions."

"I've noticed. That's why they're so baffling."

"Saviors of the Beasts…Catherine deserves so much better."

"Of course she does. I saw you picking at whole food."

Rebecca did not miss much, even with an entertaining spectacle like Patrick in the same room.

"I'm having problems with real food. Not every day, just more often."

"Does Dr Prodana know about this?"

"Not yet."

She said no more. She had no need.

"I hope I can sleep tonight. Care for an expedition down to Tunnel Twelve later? There are still crates and crates of Breedlove's old equipment to inspect."

"Only if you cannot sleep. You ought to have that junk dragged up to the surface, and donated to a museum. The rest of it should be broken up, burned, or otherwise destroyed. With no left to prosecute, it would be a good idea to preserve nothing that might give anyone else ideas."

"Sometimes…seeing the way Breedlove left things tells me something about his intent."

"Perhaps. But even in the 1960s he knew his work would not bear public scrutiny. That's why the worst of it was sealed behind concrete several levels down."

"I wonder sometimes why he did not obliterate all the evidence, especially that involving Ashlocke and the animal work beforehand. He must have hoped the day would dawn when his work would be acceptable."

"Perhaps he was too arrogant or too proud of his work. Or he hoped to sell it to old friends we think he had in more southerly locales. Mason, can such enclaves really exist or are they the stuff of movies and novels?"

"Breedlove was in regular contact with individuals bearing Germanic names. Remember carbon paper? I found carbon copies of correspondence going back to the 1950s. The content was unremarkable, but I've used the technique myself of writing in metaphors and symbols. Breedlove had a lot of secrets. Why would he file personal correspondence among technical papers unless they had some relation?"

"In other words, we don't know and probably never will know."

"Exactly."

KAREN – SIMPLY CUT OFF THE FOLLOWING PART. SO FAR, I HAVEN'T FOUND ANOTHER PLACE TO LOCATE IT, NEITHER HAVE I FOUND A NEED FOR IT.

Rebecca

Reading the notes, chiefly handwritten, gave them an urgency recapturing every medical complication besetting Mason in 1991 and 1992.

Fresh crises arose daily. His grasp upon life was tenuous; routinely his doctors thought he would die. I found something else in those notes as well: Jackie had been summoned and appeared eight different times when the doctors were convinced Mason was near death.

I had not read of this before. Mason had related only a single visit of Jackie's. They were divorced by then, but in denial, Mason never updated his personnel records until 1994. The doctors referred to them when looking for next-of-kin.

So, why did Miss Vermont show up eight times? Guilt? Regret? Morbid curiosity?

I looked up at Mason to gauge the tale his face would tell.

He was surprised. "I have no memory of that. It could have happened, but my recollection of those months is confused and disjointed. It's possible. Maybe she wanted the insurance money and wanted to see if I really was dying."

"She was that cold?"

"She could be."

Mason slipped over the edge several times, but he always clawed his way back. I admired this aspect of his character. That fierce will remained apparent. I was not sure what would be required to completely dishearten him. In everything he deemed important, he was dead game and fiercely persistent.

More than three years ago, Jackie had died in an automobile accident on Mason's birthday.

Michele and Deidre were no longer children, and no longer required the protection of children. When Michele first asked Mason to attend the funeral, flatly told her he would not.

"Jackie abandoned me while I was still alive, and left me for a man who tried to kill me. I've never allowed that miserable circumstance to affect my care or concern for you. But do not ask me to feign grief for someone who behaved badly towards me. Ask Grey. He has a handful of memories of those days."

Michele was so angry and upset she hung up. Deidre then called.

At that point, I became annoyed.

Deidre went on about how devastated they were and how they needed their father to help them take care of things.

"Where's Peter Winsor? He married her. Why is he so helpless?"

"It's complicated. His daughter Griselda just moved back in with her new baby and her two sons."

"Her name is really Griselda?"

"Yes."

"I'm still not showing up for this funeral Deidre. I will answer questions by phone, but your mother betrayed you, too, when she betrayed my trust. I am not showing up for this."

Deidre did not hang up, but she wasn't happy when the conversation ended, either.

"O Dear God."

"Anything new and different from Deidre?"

"No, the same appeal. They 'need' me."

"And you see no point to being there?"

"Just because Jackie has equilibrated to room temperature, I am supposed to Forgive All, and present a sad face?" he asked.

"I would not do it, in your position. She did a lot of damage, and based upon what I know, she never paid much of a price for her wrongdoing. She may not have become the princess of Genomex, but she did well for herself, by her measures. Stay home, if that is what you want to do."

Lilith

Adam slept on and on through the morning and into the afternoon. Finally, I lost patience with him and woke him myself. I derived greater pleasure than my face revealed kicking the bed frame, jolting him to wakefulness.

"Life hurries on, Adam. Don't you think it's high time you fell out of bed and got something done before the sun goes down?"

"What does that matter down here? There is no sun." He sounds like a petulant, whining child.

"Ah, but there is a sun out there through an eighth mile of rock. Like it or not, we are part of that world."

He sat up in bed, sullen eyed. No wonder all of his technicians at Genomex transferred to another position after beginning work for the great Dr Kane with such high hopes. None of them lasted more than fourteen months. The revolving door on Adam's lab was a great annoyance to Paul. On at least four occasions that I knew about, Paul went and chewed out Adam after a particularly good technician simply quit Genomex rather than work for Adam another hour. Not only was this a hemorrhaging of talent, but a security problem as well. Even Eckhart, who had a knack for knowing everything, knew nothing of these verbal brawls.

I was not Paul. I had no intention of arguing with Adam. I could use his talents, but if the cost became too high, Adam would one day go to sleep in Haven and wake up on a park bench half a continent away the next morning. Evading capture could occupy his overrated intellect should he prove unwilling or too lazy to contribute significantly to my projects. To free Adam from prison, I had become a prisoner myself, and done murder. I would not shelter a useless Adam.

"I'm exhausted. I never did get a good night's sleep inside the cage."

"I can believe that. Prison wasted your talents. Nevertheless, we have many things to do."

He groaned.

I smiled, all too sweetly. "Where is your scientific curiosity? You don't even know what I'm going to show you."

Adam swung his feet onto the floor and began pulling on the same pair of socks I had given him to wear on the helicopter.

"By the way, I'm going need a few changes of clothes."

"Naturally. I've ordered clothes for you. The initial delivery should arrive later today." I did not expect him to wear the same clothing until it fell apart, but I certainly was not going to allow him to wander about public shopping malls. People would remember an arrogant, demanding customer like Adam, and that I could not have.

"How did you know what to order? He asked, vague suspicion in his voice.

"Paul's notes, of course." I smiled but I did not mean it.

He trailed behind me, a wrinkled, rumpled Adam.

I should have let you stay that way for a few days. Might even have been fun to watch. I can still have fun. Just because the package is delivered does not compel me to give it to you.

"So, what kind of Genomex mutants are you making, Lili?" His tone was patronizing. He deserved what followed.

I smiled and shook my head. "No kind of mutants at all. As Paul Breedlove finally admitted to me in 2006, the Genomex mutants represent a tragic mistake, painful for the individuals involved and likely disastrous for the whole of humanity."

"You sound like Mason Eckhart."

I laughed. "Eckhart is absolutely correct. Such a view is Paul's own. Adam, you must not allow personal issues to cloud painful realities."

I had always admired Eckhart's ability to insist upon conclusions or attitudes absolutely rooted in linear, logical fact. No other factor explained his continuing ability to work with Adam for six years after Adam did his best to kill him. In the reverse circumstance, Adam could not have managed the same. His nature was far too volatile. He could not put work above his memories and emotions, which was one of Adam's critical flaws.

"So, what are you doing?" His tone was superior, condescending, with no expectation any researches of mine could eclipse those of the great Adam Kane. I wondered briefly how many enemies he must have in the scientific world, beginning with most of the people he knew from graduate school. There must be dozens of guys who cheered inwardly when Adam was sentenced to prison.

"The Genomex mutants represent a tragic error. But this does not mean humanity cannot benefit from genetic tampering."

"How is this work different from what Paul and I did?"

"Listen carefully." Adam's indifferent air infuriated me. Did he honestly think Paul would deliberately create his second android to be inferior to the first? That would have been illogical and unlike Paul. "Unlike you, whom Paul made fully functional in every sense., he designed me without eggs or ovaries. Perhaps he was squeamish about female parts. Perhaps the technical problems of engineering ova reflecting my genotype exceeded his expertise in 1972. In any case, there is no way in which I can naturally be anyone's mother, not as you could naturally father a child, even though such a child would in truth be Paul Breedlove's."

"Is this going somewhere or is it merely a lament for lost motherhood?"

Oh, Adam, you are going to pay for that.

"I have perfected the technique of taking ova from human female fetuses, removing the native mitochondria and replacing it with my own, which is actually Dr Eleanor Singer's, as you might recall."

"That seems like a lot of extra work if cloning yourself is your object."

"Nothing so simple, Adam. Human evolution has not kept pace with human technology. Society requires –demands—elite individuals capable of managing current technology and developing I even further…and further, so that one day we will control and manipulate the energy of stars. Have you read Macho Kaki's theory of the different levels of civilization?

"Never heard of him. Is he some kind of historian?"

"Theoretical physicist. You should get out more. There's more to life, and science, than Paul's brand of tormented genetics."

"Go on. Lili."

"I want to give evolution some encouragement. I have perfected the technique for making ova containing my mitochondria, containing my DNA. But they are haploid, and require fertilization by haploid sperm. In that way, every fertilization will be an independent roll of the dice, resulting in variable, but invariably intellectually superior individuals. This is not the Nazi nightmare of 'the Master Race', because these children will possess the attributes of most races, except for a few isolated peoples. Paul hired the best people he could recruit from all over the world. He also collected DNA from nearly all of them. My children will take humanity to the next technological stage."

Adam looked amused, as if listening to a child's dream of the adult world. "Who's going to beget these uber-kiddies?"

Here comes reality, Adam. Let's see how you handle this. "Isn't it obvious? You are!"

"You brought me here for stud duty?" He looked half-amused. He did not understand, not yet.

"Nothing so primal or earthy. Your duty will be far more…clinical." I laughed. "You won't suffer."

"I don't want to be used."

The fun was beginning. Adam looked deeply, profoundly offended, as if someone claimed his degrees were acquired via mail order, a comment made jokingly at Genomex with regularity. Paul knew about that, of course. Paul knew better what was done and said at Genomex than employees gave him credit for knowing.

"Adam, your dignity will remain intact." I could not resist what followed. "As intact as you are."

"That is not funny."

"But it is. Adam, it won't take long, and it's just for the initial, umm, crop, to use the term from animal husbandry. I have other candidates in mind. Genetic variety is one of my goals."

"Who are they?"

Adam sounded offended that anyone else on earth could possibly be as worthy as he was! What a moody, temperamental mess! Even among ordinary men and women, there were individuals, admittedly rare, fully as capable and accomplished as the great Adam Kane. A handful of those could beat him by daylight margins. He'd never admit it.

"Jealous? Feeling territorial, Adam?"

"No."

Yes. You are not a subtle man, Adam.

"All of this will be a fascinating study. The obscene horrors of Nazism have blighted the name of eugenics for seventy years. We can change that. We can improve the future of the whole of humanity. Without any loss to your dignity!"

Adam scowled unpleasantly at the last line. I enjoyed his torment.

And just maybe counterbalance the negative effects of the Genomex mutants and spare humanity extinction. I wasn't going to say that to Adam. He was not ready to admit, even to himself, the dark future implied by the Genomex mutants.

Rebecca

At the end of a work week I usually sleep well. This Friday evening had gone later than most because of the patience-trying dinner with Catherine and her very own Turnip, and that was followed by a post-dinner discussion and dissection of Patrick.

I was disappointed in Catherine's judgment and I resolved to talk to her alone to better understand what she was thinking. She was old enough to be thinking with greater insight and clarity than evidence indicated.

In the middle of the night, I was surprised to awaken to Mason swearing at the television screen while watching no ordinary transmission.

"Savior of the Beasts!"

The room was dark save for the illumination from the screen. I didn't have to ask to know Mason wasn't watching an old movie.

"Mason?"

"Put your glasses on and look!"

I did that, and peered at the floor-plan image of the corridor where Catherine and Patrick's rooms were located. Bright yellow numbers indicated that Patrick was not in his assigned room but in Catherine's.

"What do you think they're doing at school?" I asked.

"This is different."

"O. Under Dad's roof. Yes. Very bad judgment."

Mason was furious. He threw on his quilted bathrobe.

"What are you going to do—throw cold water on them?" I made the remark as a joke, but I was unable to imagine exactly what he planned to do.

"I might. I would not tolerate this from my other children and I will not tolerate it from Catherine. This is her mother's influence, the fickle witch. Coming with me?"

I didn't really want to be part of the adventure, but I owed Mason moral support. "Okay, but I'm putting on a bit more than you're wearing first."

"Do that while I summon the troops."

"You're taking GS agents?" This was going to be an adventure.

"Of course."

"You might frighten the tender Turnip to an early death." I laughed.

"Good. I'd be skimming the scum from the gene pool." Mason didn't laugh.

"Some advice. Don't make any reference to Danielle. Catherine knows about her mother better than you do. There is nothing for you to gain by comparing Catherine to Danielle."

Raised by Danielle –and Mason correctly described the woman as fickle, a kind way of saying what kind of woman Danielle was—Catherine had never known a woman like me. I was touched and flattered by her determination to become more like me, getting serious about her studies. We had talked a lot and I had no doubt she was not proud of some aspects of her mother's character. Knowing that, I said nothing about Danielle, and if Mason was as smart as I believed, he wouldn't either.

"I won't."

"If you ever let your opinion of Danielle be known to Catherine, she might ask questions you don't want to answer."

"To protect Catherine. Some things she does not need to know."

I nodded.

Four armed GS agents met us outside of Catherine's door. Mason was prepared to swipe his keycard and go right in.

"No!"

"Why not?"

"Because Catherine might not speak to you for years if you embarrass her enough. Knock. Ask the Turnip to step outside. You don't have to be polite to him."

"You're right."

Patrick was the one Mason wanted to shame, but I doubt he had the capacity for the emotion. I expected him to be angry with Mason for interrupting his fun. Wouldn't Patrick be surprised? Mason did enjoy surprising people.

Several minutes of knocking later, Catherine opened the door. Seeing us at this hour was unusual, but seeing us with armed agents was stunning.

"Send Patrick out here, Catherine. Immediately." Mason did not need to say anything to Catherine for her to gauge the intensity of his anger. The tone of his voice was sufficient.

More minutes later, an annoyed Patrick emerged, half-dressed and predictably sullen-eyed.

"Escort my guest back to his room and see he stays there the balance of the night."

"What?" Patrick was suddenly awake.

"There are some things not done under a father's roof. No one taught you this basic principle, so I will assist your personal growth, and teach it to you now."

Patrick was used to defying authority and if need be, buying his way out of the consequences. Genomex was not a student demonstration. Mason's authority within these walls was nearly absolute.

"You're going to have your goon squad manhandle me back to that room?"

"I suggest you comply quietly. Genomex in part is a federal facility harboring many secrets and I do have the authority to have you carried back to your room in restraints. You are not going to make that necessary, are you?

Mason sounded more casual than I knew he was. He was making a velvet-lined threat backed with steel and muscle.

Patrick scowled, and turned, shuffling back towards his room, muttering a barrage of obscenitites in ineffectual wrath and outrage. The agents followed him.

Mason knocked on Catherine's door. She opened the door enough to show her face.

"Catherine, I do not spy on you at school because I want to treat you like an adult and not as a child. I never imagined I would need to tell you that some things ought not be done by an unmarried woman under her father's roof. Good night."

"Good night, Mason." Her voice sounded small and far away.

He was still angry as we walked back to our quarters. He waited until the GS agents far down the corridor would hear none of it.

"You did well to keep that short. Catherine is well aware what she did."

"I thought Catherine had more…class than that."

"We've influenced her life for only a few years. From what you've told me about her mother, and what she's told me about her life with Danielle, I'm just not as surprised as you are."

"I don't want to see her hurt, especially by someone so unworthy of her."

"I know. I don't think Patrick gives a damn about Catherine."

"Neither do I," he said softly.

Mason

Despite the overnight excitement, I awoke early Saturday morning, and dressed as I always do for work, and have dressed for twenty years. My approach does simplify life. I tried to be quiet and not disturb Rebecca, but the woman sleeps like a prey animal and awakes to almost anything.

"Mason, it's Saturday, and it's early. What are you doing?"

Fair question. I returned to our bedroom.

"I'm going to have a little chat with Catherine's turnip. A kind of classic, what are your intentions, Young Turnip chat." I smirked, anticipating the sport just ahead.

"O Dear God. How Victorian."

"Do you disapprove?"

"Not at all. I think it will be good for Patrick's development into a real human, if that is ever to happen."

I smirked. Rebecca's sense of humor meshed with my own.

"Care to come along and watch? This could be fun."

"Thanks, but no thanks. I think this is a purely Father and Young Turnip event. Try not to become too frustrated. No matter what you say to him, I doubt he'll listen or remember."

"Probably he won't."

"He'll require many collisions with reality before he questions his attitudes., but colliding with you may just be the most memorable."

"I certainly hope that it is."

"Give me a full report later."

I had a pair of large GS agents wake Patrick and coax him into a pair of jeans. They then "accompanied" him to my office.

When they brought him through the door, I was looking down into Podding Operations, which saw little use these days. Most of the dangerous mutants who could not be medically helped or controlled with a governor were long since podded, awaiting more advanced treatment with new drugs or surgery or a combination of therapies.

The empty pods, clearly intended to contain people, possessed a sinister aspect even now. What had possessed Adam to design stasis units to resemble coffins? What had he been thinking? I had the area well-lit so Patrick would get a good look and I could make the best use of the setting.

The agents hauled Patrick to the edge of my desk, as instructed. I did not turn to face the turnip.

"Leave us."

I doubted if anyone spoke to Patrick with their back turned towards him. I continued to feign absorption with Podding.

Too bad I cannot just drop you into a pod and store you in an out of the way location and forget about you. Someone would probably miss you. But I am tempted.

"Mr Guyton, I am curious to know what your intentions are regarding my daughter."

Patrick wasn't ready for that question. I watched his reflection in the glass and saw him cast a wary glance down into Podding. Good! He then sagged down into a chair.

"Are you for real?"

The fool was amused? "Am I laughing?"

"You sound like something out of an old novel."

I turned about slowly, in no hurry, and fussed with my gloves. This tended to distract and even disturb some people. "I'm an old-fashioned man. Catherine is my daughter, and dear to me."

"You didn't marry her mother." The Turnip had the nerve to smirk at me, thinking he had achieved some small triumph.

"No. The circumstances of Catherine's birth are…complex, with unhappy consequences. As late as six years ago, her mother misled me about Catherine, implying she was not mine. The very day I received evidence to the contrary, I acted to make Catherine part of my family. My conduct since cannot be faulted. I treat her as I do the children from my marriage, in every way acting as a caring, responsible father. I have never attempted to hide her from view. It was Catherine's own decision to take my name. I did not pressure her to make that choice."

Patrick stared at me. I wished he would close his mouth; having it slightly open made him look stupid. What a waste. He wasn't stupid, just undisciplined, self-focused, lazy and haphazardly educated. His parents had done him no favors.

"Wow, that's quite a mouthful."

This young man was becoming irritating. Highly irritating, since he considered himself so noble and pure of heart.

"Each of us has responsibilities, to ourselves, our families, our friends. A life cannot be lived well if lived without direction, from moment to moment. One must have goals, direction, standards, both in one's professional and private life, or living is reduced to episodic chaos."

"I kind of like to see what each day brings. I think that's exciting." He grinned that happy grin of his, flashing his perfect teeth.

I glared at him. I had been more thoughtful at the age of ten. By that time, my mother had introduced me to the classic tales of Arthur, Robin Hood, the Iliad and the Odyssey, and so much more. I knew her family's history, and hence my own: the blood of two generals and a cabinet member of the CSA came to me through her, giving me a sense of place and obligation to perform my duties with honor and dedication.

All Patrick had was a lot of money he had not earned, and emotional beliefs rooted in bad science and self-congratulation.

"Digressing from your personal lack of direction, and to return to Catherine: what are your intentions?"

"I hadn't really thought about it."

"It's high time to start thinking about her."

"Well, Catherine's a lot of fun."

I closed my eyes and sighed, thankful I wasn't a violent man. Patrick desperately needed a slap on the head or a paddling or both. Or perhaps two dozen lashes meted out by ancestor Captain John Grey.

"Possibly that is the last thing you should say to a young woman's father. Mr Guyton, you have a singular talent for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time."

"Are you trying to get me to marry Catherine?"

"Oh, Dear God, not at all. I'm trying to understand you. What are you planning to do after graduation?"

"Well, I thought hitchhiking to Alaska would be fun. I could see a lot of nature close up and see what the world looked like before we trashed it with cities and industries. I know a couple of guys who did it, and they had a good time. They didn't like all the mosquitoes, though."

"But mosquitoes in that part of the world are very much a part of nature. However, I was thinking more in terms of career."

"Oh, that. I hadn't thought about that."

"Isn't it something you should be thinking about? You're how old?"

"Twenty."

"I was twenty-one when I started here, twenty-two when my son Grey was born. What does your father do for a living?"

"Dad and Mom travel a lot. They enjoy that."

"Before he retired, then."

"Oh, he's not retired. That's what they've always done. Great-granddad made a lot of money, and granddad grew the fortune several times over and none of us have needed to work."

"So, you see yourself doing much the same, traveling around the country, having fun…and Catherine fits into all of this…where?"

"I guess she'll be part of it until one of us gets bored. I guess I'm a kind of free spirit."

I glared at the useless lump of protoplasm. "I have another name for it, Mr Guyton."

"What's that?"

"Aimless."

The fool laughed. I had insulted him, but he was merely amused.

"My high school teachers said that, too. My professors seem more open-minded."

"Mr Guyton, in 1991 I was injured and nearly killed in an incident on site. I required specialized medical care to survive. I could have retired at age thirty, and lived well on the disability payments and the non-trivial settlement Genomex made."

"That sounds like a good deal—money for doing nothing."

"But I continued working. Do you have any idea why? Can you imagine a reason I would choose work over indolence?" All of my self-control was required to keep me from shouting.

"Dunno. I would have taken the money and had a good time. I want to enjoy life. I would have dedicated my life to saving plants, animals, and helping miserable underpaid workers."

"Then, I will explain: to be certain my children would be educated and prepared to be successful adults, and also for my own self-respect. An individual needs direction, Mr Guyton. Worrying over obscure toad species is not a life; it's a diversion from life."

"I don't see how running Genomex is so special. You're just making money. You're not making the world better or preserving species."

"You're quite wrong. The main mission of Genomex is the preservation of a species, the human species. Along the way we do some unique research and generate a profit. Try to live without being in some way productive, Mr Guyton."

Patrick laughed. "Everyone tells me I'm a great guy. Are they all wrong?"

"Your peers? Your parents? What do you expect them to say? You're an overaged boy at best, a pampered, entertaining pet at worst."

"You're serious."

Patrick had finally realized that our conversation was not an extended joke. The smile abandoned his face and the resentment he had shown last night dominated his features.

"I'm a very serious man. What are you going to do when you're not quite so handsome, your hair has fallen out, your buddies have careers, and you are still hitchhiking to Alaska, agonizing over the fate of toads? Nothing stays the same; change is the only thing life guarantees."

"I've never worried about things like that. I think about things corporate drones are too selfish or insensitive to care about. I'll always have money."

"Money isn't enough. Life without money is miserable, but money alone does not make a life."

"Are you saying you don't like me?"

Patrick had taken a long time to perceive the obvious.

"You are immature and forgettable, a curious throwback to the misguided of the 1930s and 1960s. I don't like you for my Catherine."

"What are you going to do about it?" There was an element of challenge in his voice. He was accustomed to getting his own way no matter what the circumstances.

"Catherine is of age. I cannot impose my wishes upon her. I can only hope you will tire of her quickly, sooner rather than later, and without inflicting enduring scars. She inherited my intelligence; she does not require me to explain you. She will sort you out herself."

"You think she's really something, don't you?" Patrick laughed.

I glared at him in disbelief, and wished Catherine could see him now. "I'm her father. The people I love, I protect fiercely, if they let me."

"You think you have all the answers."

"I have a good many of them. I want to thank you for this discussion. You have clarified a lot for me."

I walked around my desk, indicating that the discussion had ended. Patrick sat in his chair, immobile.

"Come along, Mr Guyton. This discussion is at an end."

"I just want to sit here awhile and think."

"Not in my office. No one is allowed in here save in the presence of Rebecca or me."

"How does she put up with you?"

"I wonder about that myself, sometimes. I've decided her tolerance of me is rooted in the reality that our relationship is based upon more than fun and lust."

"I can imagine…at your age."

I smirked at the jackass. Are you going to get up out of that chair, or must I call security to carry you out of it?"

Patrick oozed out of his chair like slowly melting butter.

You are a waste of the air you breathe.

Lilith

"There! Isn't this better than being in prison?" I did my best to sound cloyingly cheerful, hoping to annoy Adam.

Adam scowled at me. He was a miserable individual to work with, whining about the repetitive nature of the lab work we were both performing.

"I don't think I can tolerate finishing another row."

"Of course you can." I kept my tone patronizingly and pleasant.

I could not believe he was actually embarrassed by what we were doing, but hours ago I had concluded that was part of his annoyance. The great Adam Kane, embarrassed by his own wrigglers! And I had no one with whom to share the observation.

We were fertilizing my engineered ova by the dozens, and placing them in vessels I called 'decanters', to maintain the Huxleian theme. I was stunned when Adam failed to immediately recognize the reference, but I was getting a better and better idea just how narrow Adam's education was. Surely he did not think I had a few hundred surrogate mothers prepared! But he did not ask, and I had come to relish surprising him.

"My back is beginning to hurt," he whined.

Who cares, Adam!

"Well then. Get up, walk around, and then return to the task at hand."

"What is the point of all this, Lili?"

"To make a better human. This is the logical continuation of Paul's mission."

"I don't recall him talking much about this kind of research."

"That's because you worked with him primarily in the days when he was sidetracked by the creation of human freaks. He wasted so much time on that effort, and gained so little good. You should have kept in contact with him after you bolted Genomex."

I knew what was coming. Eckhart wasn't an accountant, but he had people working for him who were. Paul was deeply disturbed when proof was presented of Adam siphoning off huge amounts of money in the mid-1990s prior to 'escaping' (Adam's word!) from Genomex in 1998. Adam told people he had constructed Sanctuary with money made in the tulipomania stock markets of that decade, and that was true. However, the money for his original investments was embezzled.

"I planned to contact Paul. I was always so busy…"

Yep, between 1998 and 2007, you never had any free moments to pick up a phone. And if Paul had divulged your location to Eckhart, which he very likely would have done after learning the magnitude of your theft, you would have been arrested and charged with embezzlement. After Paul protected you from prosecution for attempting to murder Eckhart, you knew very well Eckhart would not rest until you were punished for something, someday.

"What was it like, leading Mutant X, having the dumb, devoted trust and loyalty of the people you doomed to pain and an early death?"

Adam looked up from his work. If looks could kill…but they cannot, and Adam was dependent up0n my good will for his survival.

"Lili, I was helping the members of Mutant X stay alive."

"Bull-oney, Adam Kane. Save that for people who don't know your history. We both know you used them to continue your experiments."

"Well, they were helped."

He wasn't even bothering to tell a story!

"Adam, what you did was unconscionable. I say that admitting Paul was to blame as well. But while Paul had sense enough to proceed cautiously after producing Gabriel Ashlocke, you displayed no restraint at all. Paul made mutants by the handful. You streamlined the techniques and made thousands. How many times did you have to make a mistake to conclude your work was flawed? Or was something else involved, the fact you were tampering with mere humans as opposed to carefully engineered androids like ourselves?"

"I'm a physician, Lili. I swore an oath to help people."

"Tell that to the parents whose children died before they reached the age of twenty five because their immune systems imploded."

Adam jumped out of his task chair and stood over me menacingly. I cursed myself for not being better prepared to deal with his volatile anger. He was behaving predictably. Adam had no appreciation of the fact Paul had built me to be several times stronger than an untrained woman my size, for my own protection. Using ordinary lab tools at hand, I could inflict fatal wounds easily, or serious wounds with slightly less effort. But this was not the time to surprise Adam.

I grasped one of my lab coat buttons, twisting it between my thumb and forefinger as if nervous.

I wasn't nervous. The button was a security device, summoning two of the men who helped me break Adam out of prison.

They burst into the lab soon after. Both topped six feet and were heavily muscled. They were more than muscle; they were brilliant individuals, well-educated generalists. Saying nothing, they evaluated the situation immediately, and stood staring at Adam. If he did anything that could harm me, Matt and John would literally tear Adam apart in my defense.

"Adam, why don't you sit down and get back to work? We have so much to do."

He wasn't happy about it, but he knew he was outflanked. He sat down, cursing.

I turned to the two brothers –that is what they were—and softly said, "Thank you." They nodded and left.

"You must pay your goons well to inspire such devotion."

"If you talked to them, you would discover they're highly intelligent, educated young men. They're a good deal more than 'muscle'."

"Yeah," he scowled sarcastically.

Loyalty like that you do not purchase, the loyalty of sons to their mother. For I was their mother. Adam might figure that out in time. I chuckled inwardly to myself.

What would Adam think if he asked them their ages, and they answered with the truth that they were seven and seven and a half years old respectively? You continue to underestimate me. For all your intelligence, you are a silly man.

Rebecca

Despite the excess of excitement overnight, and Mason's fatherly encounter with the Turnip, Saturday afternoon and evening proved tame.

Mason was on his best behavior, that is, he was being subtle with the Turnip. We set off to a Waterhouse exhibit a couple hours away. Three of us were content; this was part of the continuing catch-up phase of Catherine's education. Patrick seemed bored, seeing only "pretty pictures". When Mason began pointing out to Catherine the mathematical elements in the composition of the works, Patrick was stunned. Corporate bad guys were not supposed to know things that he did not know himself. After all, Patrick was the designated 'sensitive' guy. I added further confusion to Patrick's mind with commentary on the influence of the development of the synthesis of ever-brighter, more lightfast, and less toxic pigments upon painting. I had learnt none of this in a formal setting, but in reading done after taking up watercolors.

Afterwards, we had a slow, casual dinner at a restaurant specializing in world fusion cooking. Patrick was baffled by the menu, but I give him credit for being game enough for trying Tex-Mex Masala on my recommendation instead of gutlessly ordering a hamburger.

The drive home (how curious to think of Genomex as home) was long enough for me to fall asleep, worn out by the day. Mason didn't stay awake, either, but fell asleep holding me. Catherine and Patrick were in the middle seat, GSA lackeys up front.

Catherine was not happy with Patrick. I didn't know the roots of her unhappiness, but at the museum her displeasure was not subtle. I was pleased to see her rationality and good judgment engaged.

I woke up to hear them speaking quietly.

"Patrick, that isn't nice."

"But look at them. They're old. They look like a couple kids back there."

Catherine paused before answering, a habit of Mason's. I could not recall if she had always done that, or picked it up from time spent with her father.

"I think it's sweet."

"And they were holding hands in the museum, too."

"When I'm their age, I hope someone will want to hold my hand. I don't see anything wrong with anything they are doing."

"But it looks so odd seeing anyone that old doing that stuff."

"They don't take each other for granted, Patrick. Not like some people do with each other. And another thing: I'm getting tired of you making fun of my father. I warned you ahead of time that he wasn't like anyone else. He's been very good to me. So has Rebecca."

Catherine managed to make the Turnip shut up! And she was thinking rationally about him! My faith in her was not misplaced.

I shifted myself about in the dark SUV to become comfortable and continue my nap.

Mason squeezed my hand. I opened one eye slightly, peeked at him, and discerned the faint trace of a sly smile by the fleeting light of oncoming headlights. He had heard everything.

Mason

Catherine and I were both early risers. We had agreed to meet and talk the day before, out by the lakefront. Only a handful of employees showed up at such an hour on Sundays, so most likely we'd have all the privacy we could want. No one would catch sight of me wearing jeans.

Anxious not to miss an opportunity to talk to Catherine, I arrived just past sunrise. She appeared not long after.

"Good morning, Mason."

"Good morning to you, Catherine."

"Well, I don't have to ask if you like Patrick."

Catherine was as blunt and direct as I was. Once she found her niche in life and gained confidence in her abilities and knowledge, she would be formidable, perhaps my equal. Perhaps better than me. She was more like me than any of my other children.

"You know I won't lie to you."

"Are you going to try and talk me out of him?"

"I was, but after Dr Steyn explained some Psychology of the Young Woman to me, I understand now the more I spoke against him, the less you would listen and the more inclined you would be to defend him. I won't present you with a list of things I don't like about Patrick and all the ways he is unworthy of you."

Catherine laughed. "I thought I was going to have a big argument with you."

I shook my head. "No. That would a tiring waste of a beautiful morning."

"What are you going to do?"

"Nothing. I'm going to allow Patrick the opportunity to braid the rope with which he will hang himself. After he's done that, I promise not to embarrass you with 'I told you so'."

"I didn't expect this."

"Some things we must learn ourselves."

"He's very smart."

"You're smarter. You are inherently more intelligent. You have the habit of stuffing your brain with a spectrum of information and skills, and you are acquiring the useful talent of putting things together in unexpected ways. That's why I'm going to let you find the truth on your own, if you don't know it already."

I wish I could spare you the lesson, but Rebecca is right about this. Can you tell how proud I am of you, Catherine?

"Okay."

"Does Patrick know what you are?"

As soon as I had said it, I wished the words had come together with greater grace. What Catherine was, a Genomex mutant, at once bound us and separated us. I could not change past misdeeds, and would not pretend they never happened. At awkward moments like this, I knew very well I had delivered some measure of hurt to one of the people I loved best. The miserable reality of the Genomex mutants blighted my life and the relationship I had carefully built with my long unknown and much-cherished daughter.

"I'm sorry for the way that sounded, Catherine. But does he know?"

She shook her head. "Nobody at school knows. And I know you weren't trying to be nasty. I know when you're trying to be nasty."

"Good."

"It's hard to know how to ask questions like that."

"I do not read Patrick as a personality to be entrusted with such information."

"Yeah. There are two people at school I'm pretty sure are mutants. Odd things happen around them. They're not careful, and they drop hints. Some people just don't know which secrets to keep."

"No."

"Even around someone named Eckhart." She smiled.

I smiled back. "Can you keep a secret? A serious one?" I already knew her answer, but the question had to be posed and the promise made.

"Sure."

"Someone broke Adam out of prison Thursday night. He's back in the wide world. Sooner or later he will show up here. He cannot stay away from me."

"I didn't hear or read anything about a prison escape."

"There's a news blackout. Someone came in with a helicopter gunship, and blasted the prison, all for Adam."

"That took money."

"Money, planning, organization, connections. Acquiring such a craft is not like purchasing a used airliner. Eleven prison guards were murdered just so Adam could walk free."

"Why are you telling me this?" Shadows settled across her young face. She knew as well as I the deep flaws in Adam's character. She did not hate him as I did, but she did resent his attempts to manipulate and use her.

"Because I knew you would be interested."

"I am. And?"

"I want you to be cautious. I don't know what Adam might do, but no doubt he rightly blames me for his incarceration, and I expect he will attempt some vengeance. I fear he will seek out you, and hurt you to hurt me. The intelligence I have at hand doesn't even allow a guess at what Adam is doing. All I know is that he was broken out by a woman who worked here several years ago. Rebecca recognized her from the video record."

"A woman?"

"She looked like a woman. I suspect she is what Adam is, an android."

"Adam never said anything about another android."

"Adam's in denial about his true nature. He does not admit to himself what he is."

"I'll be careful."

"Catherine, I don't check up on you at school. But I know there are secret mutant associations, brotherhoods, whatever you want to call them."

"You're not asking me to rat on people…what is this about?"

"No. I don't even want you to tell me whether you know of particular groups. But should you do so, try to warn them against being used by Adam and this woman. Adam may contact such groups."

"Will do. But…"

I interrupted her. "I don't want to know details. Just remember all the pain Adam has caused in pursuit of his unholy research."

"Some people still believe Adam's a hero." Catherine shrugged.

"There is a delusion for every taste."

"Those two silly people I think are mutants? One of them lives in my dorm. For a long time, she only knew my first name. When she finally saw my last name on a piece of mail, she asked if I was 'any relation to the creep who rounded up and persecuted mutants and fought against Adam Kane."

"And you told her…?"

Catherine laughed, relishing the memory. "I handled it the way I've seen Rebecca handle the analogous question: 'Yeah. I'm Mr Creepy's daughter.'"

I smirked. "Did she turn and run, screaming in horror at being in the presence of Catherine Creepy?"

"Noooo. I parted my hair," and while saying this, Catherine demonstrated, "and told her, 'It's okay. I didn't inherit the Eckhart horns.'"

"I would have liked to have seen that. You may lack the familial horns, but you have the wicked sense of humor."

"Thank you!" she laughed. "What do you hear about Brennan?"

"He still craves Nutty Bars and is highly proficient in the manufacture of license plates. At long last, he has acquired an honest skill."

"Think he'll ever be paroled?"

"Not until he's past fifty, and not then if I'm around to influence the outcome. And yes, with Adam's escape, he is being watched with great care."

"I don't think Adam will do anything for Brennan. Adam never cared about anyone else, unless they could do something for him. Brennan is of no use to him now."

"I agree. I expect Adam will come back here. He always does. He cannot help himself."

"Yeah. He thinks you're the Antichrist."

"That has been the case for over twenty years. He never wearies of it. He may even believe what he says."

"Well, you know the truth about him."

"Sometimes, I think I know too many truths. Truth can be a burden."

Rebecca

I was relieved when Catherine and her Beast-Savior Turnip left to return to school. Catherine I always wanted to see, but the Turnip was one of the most irritating personalities I had known, and I'd worked for some bizarre personalities.

Mason endured the visit with more restraint than I believed he possessed. The temptation to verbally smash the Turnip was so powerful I imagined Mason reducing Patrick to quivering, terrified protoplasm by 2 PM Sunday. Instead, he allowed Patrick to blather on about his imperiled toads, the evils of capitalism, animal rights (and yes, he did wear leather shoes), and so much more, making sly comments whose sarcasm and wit were completely lost on Patrick.

All of this had worn on Mason. The Turnip wasn't an inept employee who would predictably and completely depart Mason's world at 5 PM. No, the Turnip was involved with Catherine. Mason never said as much to me, but Catherine was his favorite. Their minds worked in the same way. Mason held high hopes for Catherine and did not want them derailed by Patrick.

Influencing Mason to do something was an art form. By Sunday afternoon, however, I had no difficulty getting him to take a nap. He looked exhausted. He still was unaccustomed to anyone else noticing his health, other than those who wished him dead.

To thoroughly understand his condition, I had sifted through the notes Mason's doctors made in the early 1990s. Over the last dozen years all indications were of a slow but consistent improvement. Fortunately, these notes were thorough and complete. Breedlove had been fascinated with Mason's condition, as his notes made clear. Extensive testing was documented over two decades.

The most recent data made me doubt how necessary the precautions in place were. Contrary to prediction, my presence had no measurable effect; he continued improvement. Perhaps the biopolymer skin and multiply filtered air could be left behind. One specialist was convinced that my presence had hastened Mason's improvement, by constantly challenging his immune system.

Nevertheless, I was convinced he was losing weight. I feared a relapse more than anything else, but I knew any number of things could have gone awry.

"Maybe we'll be lucky, and never have to see Patrick again," I said to Mason.

"He's a lost soul. I'm hoping he does Catherine a favor and gets bored with her. He has no sense at all of how worthless he is. Patrick may be the same person in twenty years as he is today."

"How often is Dr Prodana weighing you?"

"Every Wednesday."

"Make me a happy woman and have her weigh you tomorrow morning. Just humor me. I think you're losing weight."

"You do?"

"Yes."

I never deluded myself into believing Mason's health was anything other than precariously balanced on a knife-edge. Nevertheless, I had become used to continuing improvement in barely perceptible increments.

The possibility of regression was frightening.

He was looking through our house plans again. We had spent hours with an architect, outlining our special requirements.

On the outside, the structure would look ordinary enough. Inside, all of the air would be filtered. Each entrance had a double set of doors. A portion of the interior completely duplicated our present quarters, but with more windows and space. Other portions of the house contained a 'public' area, which included the kitchen, bedrooms for guests (Mason's progeny and future grand-get, Samihah and her sons) a family room, and a library for my books.

One could 'walk' through the house, see what it looked like from any point in any room. Mason and I tweaked the plan constantly, refining and enhancing it.

He talked only vaguely about building it. Sometimes, he placed construction near Grey and his wife Julie, sometimes in a place of our choosing, but the site I wanted no part of was on the grounds of Genomex itself. I had no desire of spending the rest of my days in the place where Breedlove and Adam had created mankind's possible end. Mason needed prompt access to good medical care, but I did not want to live at the site where his afflictions were induced. I had bad memories of my own at Genomex, things Mason knew nothing about.

I stood behind him. "I think I would like a front porch. I imagine myself in a rocking chair watching the sun set. Or rise. Or both. There could be porches fore and aft."

"I cannot picture you in a rocking chair."

"My great-aunt Circe had a house with a huge front porch and several rocking chairs. I loved going there as a kid in the summers."

"Circe?"

"Her father taught Greek mythology. She had a twin sister named Medea. When are we going to build this?"

"Good question. Certainly not with Adam running loose in the streets. I don't want Adam turning up at my kitchen door some fine afternoon, asking to borrow a cup of sugar."

"You have a point. But building this house might be simpler than we thought."

"How so?"

He was walking though the virtual rooms again, imagining himself living there. It was a better dream than dwelling upon Adam. Adam would never leave us in peace. Now that he was no longer safely penned, sooner or later he would manage to make us miserable. Worse, he now appeared to have a powerful ally in Lilith.

"We don't have to duplicate this steel cave. I found a file about how it was originally constructed. It wasn't built here, but in five modules in Illinois, including the air and water filtration units. The modules could be disassembled and leave Genomex on flatbed trucks the same way they were delivered. They could be put back together, and we could live in the cave while the house was built around it."

"When this suite was designed and assembled, I was mostly insane, a medical mess. I have no orderly memory of several months. Everything runs together. Not that I want to recall much of what happened."

"There are some memories one is better off without."

"True."

Mason

To recruit the best physicians and researchers for St Katherine's, I spread the recruitment net worldwide, yielding a unique and superlative staff. My scholarship program intended to produce medical doctors who were themselves Genomex mutants or their children had not been in existence long enough for anyone to yield results, but we had recruited some gifted individuals who later revealed themselves to be mutants. The support staff was no less elite and able.

I had reason for confidence in work coming from St Kats.

I dreaded the results of Jessica Anne's genetic testing. The chances of her proving to be a plain vanilla human were slight, but I still hoped. I knew better, but I still hoped. The time between sampling and reporting of hard data would have been intolerable otherwise. I knew all along what was coming.

I had the report hand-carried to me by the MD/PhD who devised and refined the procedures to determine the presence of genotypes characteristic of the Genomex perversions. Dr Athellen Lee had worked for me since 2008. She knew my preference for brief, succinct reports, and knew that if I wanted more details, I would ask questions or request the full technical report.

Dr Lee entered my office without a ritual greeting, understanding, as I did, that such an exchange trivialized the seriousness of the report she delivered and placed on my desk before me without comment. She sat silently while I read her summary.

I looked up when I was done.

"I already know your answer, Dr Lee, but I must ask. Do you have any doubts about your conclusion?"

She shook her graying head. "No doubts. The data clearly, unambiguously indicate that this child will walk through walls and affect the emotions of others. The only uncertainty is the strength of these abilities, but that is unknowable before adulthood."

I bent down, held my head in my hands, and revisited an old and painful memory, and was surprised to find my grief sharp and fresh.

"Years ago, I knew a baby girl, born of two mutants who had dual sets of powers. Along with those powers, the combined inheritance doomed Jean to an early death within months. Is there a possibility of this child suffering such a fate?"

This was my last chance of escaping the necessity of making a decision I knew carried the potential for destroying me.

"Aside from the typical mutant frailties, this girl will be healthy and normal."

I sighed, and looked up.

Do you have any idea what you have just told me, Dr Athellen Lee?

"I hoped this child would beat the odds, and prove to be plain human. Thank you for attending to this determination quickly and thoroughly."

"Carrying double talents will make this girl's life complicated and difficult. I wish my news was better."

"So do I."

Dr Lee rose from her chair, and left me alone with horrors to contemplate.

Some time before I had worked through what would be done when the results were official. I summoned Dr Prodana to my office, and instructed her on the assembly of the team required for the next step. Dr Prodana, of course knew nothing about why I would want such a team. She did not ask.

Rebecca

I don't like surprises.

I don't like it when an instrument breaks down late Friday afternoon, when the manufacturer's technical support staff has already started the weekend, and the samples the technician was good enough to come in early and begin prepping at 5.30 AM to insure the complete lot would be ready for an automated run over the week are beginning to look like a complete wash, unless you can puzzle out the arcana of the CD manual, with the important information scattered in at least eight places, no section overlapping or in any way related.

All too much like life.

I like order. I don't care for surprises. I especially dislike people surprises.

I've experienced enough chaos. The memories I push out of the way so I can function. I create little rituals, daily routines that act to fool my mind into believing there are things of permanence, things that endure, things of lasting value, things I can influence and control. The only unchanging thing in the world is the general rottenness of other people.

I prefer a broken down, leaking Agilent HPLC drooling pH 2.5 buffer solution all over the bench top and floor to a broken person any day. The leak I can fix and the drool I can clean up, but after putting my heart into fixing them a little or a lot, the broken person may get the idea to maim or kill me as often as they are thankful. You never know.

I prefer animals for the same reason. Win the trust of a stray cat, take her in, feed her, clean the parasites inside and out, make sure she has vaccinations, talk to her, play with her, keep her warm and safe, and you have a buddy for life. Treat a supposedly sentient human being with the same loyalty, kindness, and yes, love, and who knows what you will receive in return?

Theft? Defamation of character? Maiming? Maybe all three. Maybe murder, too.

People don't want to believe this, even though the evidence is all around.

Some time ago I stopped telling the stories I knew from women who survived murder attempts by spouses and significant others. Most people dismissed my stories as not credible despite local media reporting events exactly as I did. Mason was one of the few exceptions who listened and believed. He knew I did not lie or exaggerate, and he also knew how rotten people were.

"You must be seeking out nutso women," most men would say, at once declaring there was something wrong with me for knowing these women, who were coworkers, not people I had selected as friends, and that there must be something wrong with such women. Nothing like blaming the victim. Then there is the explanation that men in general do not like women as people and would much prefer a world free of women, who would not then take "their" jobs, or annoyingly own more than two pairs of shoes. Paradise defined, for many of them.

Upon reflection, what I found oddest of all was the lack of comments akin to "What kind of nutcase tries to burn down his girlfriend's house, believing she's sleeping inside (alone)" or "What kind of whack job repeatedly stabs his wife without any solid evidence she has done anything wrong?" Fortunately, the stabbed woman was an RN and she managed to make it to a neighbor's house to summon help. I would have liked to know what happened afterward, but she was admitted to a hospital under a false name for her own protection, and afterwards I could not track her.

The implication was that these women had brought violence upon themselves, that they deserved burning and stabbing.

We're nowhere near as civilized as we choose to believe. Committing violent acts against another adult was only part of it. Atrocities committed against children beggared belief.

O, I knew history was full of stories about infanticide, especially in societies that considered female children "useless eaters". European societies commonly had formal institutions allowing babies to be abandoned and readily adopted. Astonishingly, this practice was not limited to the poor.

I knew all of that. I also still mourned –privately-- my three lost babies. Mason suggested adoption, but I wanted babies carrying my own DNA, every cell infused with my own mother-line mitochondria.

People did things I did not understand. As disturbing as my conclusions about the general attitudes of men were, evidence did not make me think well of women, either.

How could a woman carry a child, give birth in a toilet, wrap up the evidence, stuff it into a trash barrel and then return to a high school dance?

How could a mother leave five children alone in a house while she went to a nightclub, the house burning down in her absence?

How could a woman entrust a young child to the care of a boyfriend, not the child's father, with the boyfriend literally cooking the toddler to death in scalding water?

How could a mother buckle her two sons securely into the back seat of her car, and then send that car rolling off into a lake, drowning her babies, in the hope of gaining the attention and companionship of a man who made clear he wanted her but not her boys?

The commonality is one of violence against weaker people. I spent most of my adult life keeping people at a safe distance, making few exceptions. I wanted my days orderly, and reasonably safe.

Usually I have enough presence of mind to scan my phone's caller ID function to determine if I should ignore it. My labs were already packed floor to ceiling –well, as close to the ceiling as the fire codes allowed—with instrumentation computers, printers, none of it outdated, fully supporting the needs of Genomex, St Kats and satellite locations. I didn't want to talk to sales people because the labs weren't in need of anything and I had no idea where we would put anything else. I didn't want to waste their time or my own.

I did not recognize the phone number, which was local. I answered the phone, prepared to sort through mail delivered Saturday while making quick work of the call.

"Rebecca, it's Rob Abelmann."

I really do not like surprises.

"Rob? Where are you?" The far side of the moon, I hope.

"I'm in town. I never left."

Dr Robert Abelmann was one of the brightest people ever to don a Genomex lab coat. He very well could have been Adam's equal, or even better than Adam. Unfortunately, he had a conscience.

Rob found out exactly what Breedlove and Adam were doing. For a time, he accepted the lies they told in explanation. His insights advanced the creation of the genetic blasphemies hidden away down in the deepest recesses of Genomex. No one is irreplaceable; these things could have been done without Rob, but it would have taken Breedlove and Adam several more years than it did.

The conflict between the kind of man Rob was and the horrors he created proved too great. Predictably, his marriage fell apart. But that was just the beginning.

How do I know so much? Because, when it came to Rob Abelmann, I had not behaved as well as I should have.

When I came to Genomex in 1992, I was in a state of emotional chaos. Divorcing my gelding Jeff was expensive and crazy-making. I should have had the marriage annulled immediately, but I was embarrassed by the absurdity of marrying a neuter, and not knowing it going in.

No one wants to believe such a thing is possible, but their minds are too marinated in pop culture. Anything is possible. I personally knew two women whose marriages had never been consummated.

I wanted to forget Jeff and put some emotional distance between my past errors and the present. I wanted to shut myself away from everything, and just not be bothered any longer. People are too much trouble.

By the middle of 1993, the professional competition between Adam and Rob was peaking. Rob had little else left; his divorce was a few years in the past and his ex-wife had taken their two little girls across country to Santa Barbara where her parents lived. Rob adored those girls. His contact with them became limited to phone calls monitored by their mother.

My antipathy towards Adam was becoming Genomex Lore. Opportunity can present itself anywhere, and so it was that one morning I found myself waiting for Adam to finish at a copier.

My presence made Adam uncomfortable and nervous. I knew that. I made a point of standing much closer to him that I naturally would have chosen to do with anyone else, enjoying the sight of Adam fumbling with the reduction functions, and throwing useless copies into the trash.

There were other copying machines I could have used with no waiting, but why use them when there was fun to be had at Adam's expense?

Adam continued killing trees and began talking to himself, swearing as the copier ran out of paper and the Great Adam Kane faced the challenge of re-stocking the tray.

If packages of paper had not been stacked next to the copier, Adam would have been completely thwarted. As it was, he was merely mystified, puzzled by the arcane process of unlocking the tray.

There were instructions clearly written on the front of the copier, but Adam was too good for instructions. He mutter some more, then wandered off as if abandoning the effort.

I took a step or two forward, undid the tray release, and began unwrapped the copier paper.

Adam stopped and turned at the sound of the tray releasing, and in short order he returned, hovering over me.

"Thanks for doing that for me."

With that, he returned to copying his own materials!

I hope every sheet jams.

Alas, no sheets jammed.

Adam finally finished his copying, and stalked off rapidly. He had left the reduction functions in place, and an original on the platen. The original turned out to be typed notes for his next presentation. The work looked familiar, probably more 'original' work of Adam's reported years before in the literature. I was never really sure if Adam was re-doing old work, or actually committing intellectual theft. Perhaps, he was doing a bit of both.

I could put this in Adam's mailbox, and let him know someone knows his game. No. That is too subtle for Adam.

I glanced around. No one else was in sight. I grabbed the great Dr Kane's discards from the trash. He mistakenly reduced them to near-unreadability, but not quite. I was able to put the trash gleanings to use, and came to the next Projects meeting well prepared, leaving copies of a particular paper in the mailboxes of everyone who would be at the meeting…except Adam.

Adam had reduced most attendees to near-slumber. Even Mason Eckhart's discipline was failing him; I saw him nodding. I was wide-awake however, anticipating the perfect moment when I would ambush Adam before this group, and if I wasn't careful, probably destroy my career at Genomex.

Adam droned on, confident he was awing his technical audience.

Not today, Adam.

The proper moment was close for the ambush. Timing was everything.

Adam had very nearly maneuvered himself exactly where I wanted him. "Are there any questions?" He was smiling that arrogant, I know more than you do smile, but not for much longer.

As it turned out, someone else led the charge.

Joe Mayakovsky was a brilliant molecular biologist. Everyone respected his work and his opinions, and after Joe asked the fateful question, no one thought of Adam again in quite the same way.

"Adam, how is this any different than the work of Kraler et alia in the paper you put in our boxes?"

Kraler, Fujitsu, and Canfield's paper had appeared in the April-May-June 1989 issue of Communications of the Society of Experimental Genetics of Economically Valuable Livestock. While this journal was not exactly found gracing coffee tables and waiting rooms everywhere, it was a perfectly legitimate scientific journal.

Whether Adam was aware of this paper or not I do not know, but he should have known of it. A casual reading of the abstract revealed the haunting parallels to Adam's presentation.

Adam should have performed a literature search and found KFC's paper with the same ease I had. The subject was far afield from my specialty, but the Genomex library had outstanding search capabilities.

Adam was both furious and confused. He leaned over Mason Eckhart to quickly scan the abstract. Mason hated having anyone in such proximity, but I did not know that then.

"Take my copy, Adam. Please."

Adam took the stapled papers and read the abstract quickly. Adam had a lot of personal control, but anyone watching him could tell he was stunned by the existence of the paper.

"Well, this shores up my work."

Mayakovsky wasn't buying. "Adam, this had a publication date of 1989. I think you just shored up their work."

Joe was being cool and controlled, but he could read Adam's face as well as anyone, and it was obvious that Adam had been shown to be less than honest, something we all knew but rarely could confirm.

"Well, I guess I have, haven't I?" Adam declared abruptly, gathering up his notes and transparencies. "The meeting's over."

Adam had to have a good idea who had set up this debacle, but he could not be certain. Two weeks ago, another of his technicians had quit suddenly, and the month before, another had transferred to another group. They had friends in the building who could have done it. His former and current technicians would know what he had been working on—they had been doing the work! Any employee had access to the mailboxes.

If he asked Mason to review the security videotape to reveal who placed papers in boxes, he'd be admitting ignorance of the paper, which he could never do. Also, I had taken care to slip the copies I one at a time, at different hours of the day over three days. I wasn't going to show up doing a mass distribution.

I had taken a stupid chance, but I felt good about the way things had turned out.

Samihah walked with me from the meeting. "Just when Adam had sunk nearly all of us into comas, someone sinks Adam into ridicule. Most amusing."

"Do you think Adam knew anything about that work?"

"I do not think so. I have watched Adam for many years, and while I believe he is capable of serious borrowing form someone else's work, his arrogance is such that he would not go looking for a paper and then slavishly duplicate the work. Adam's weakness is his conviction that no one else in the universe will have the same masterstroke insights as the incomparable Adam. But as we both know, people have the same ideas. Some ideas appear to have a proper time to be 'born', and pop out all over independently."

"Adam's in his own world."

"Oh, absolutely. It's a wonder someone has not embarrassed Adam in this fashion before. I wonder if we will ever know who did it?"

"I did it."

"Oh, Rebecca!"

I related the story of the adventure at the copier. Samihah giggled.

"I hope I don't lose my job over this."

"Adam has been going to Paul Breedlove complaining about dozens of people as long as I have worked here. What I hear is that Breedlove hardly listens to what he says, because it's all personal and petty. But do be careful with Adam; you are on his list now."

"I've been on Adam's list. Within the first six months I was here, I had to call security to drag Adam away from my desk, where he was going through my desk and purse."

"I heard that story but I did not believe it could be true." Samihah laughed. "What was he looking for?"

"Personal information, but I cannot be certain of that. Maybe he was looking for quarters for a vending machine."

Samihah giggled. "Perhaps you should ask Mr Eckhart to have security check your car for explosive devices the next few days."

"You don't really think…"

"Oh, no, Adam's pretentious but not crazy. That was merely a joke. But I'd wager a case of petri dishes that if you asked him, Mr Eckhart would cheerfully inspect your car, probably personally."

Samihah was a perceptive people watcher. She took in my puzzled look, smiled, and said nothing more.

Later that morning, Dr Rob Abelmann strolled into my lab, and asked me to lunch.

In my mind, we dated casually, but not in Rob's. How was I to know? After the nightmare of Jeff, I wanted male attention, but only on my terms and at my convenience.

One day when time came for lunch, I decided I wasn't hungry and that I really wanted to stay at my desk and work up notes for the next chapter I was writing. Then the next day, I did much the same.

Rob was upset. At the time, I did not understand why. My general observation even then was that men generally found none of us very special, if they could tell us apart at all. A good many of them harbored a deep dislike of women, camouflaged unconvincingly behind 'jokes' about women and tales of the stupidity of their wives and girlfriends.

I told Rob I was sorry, but there were things I needed to do, and I didn't have time for anyone. Fortunately, when I told him this, we were standing in the Genomex parking lot and when Rob started yelling at me there wasn't much of an audience. Rob had made some assumptions about the nature and direction of the relationship because of his need for stability. I was still paying off the small fortune in legal bills involved in getting rid of Jeff and dreaded another legal quagmire. Emotionally I was on autopilot, not concerned with much save protecting myself from further, deeper damage.

Rob was a deeply wounded creature himself. He craved a lot of attention. At that point in my life I did not have that to give to anyone.

I told him I wasn't going to stand there in the hot sun and listen to him berate me for not being who he needed. I got in my car and left.

That evening was wonderful. In the quiet and solitude I worked through several difficult passages.

That's when I began my serious retreat from the world. I was comfortable. I could control my world and everything that happened in it.

Rob continued to spiral down. Eventually, his guilt became too great of a burden and he walked out of Genomex one day.

Could I possibly have helped? Probably. Did I contribute to his descent? Probably. Pragmatically, I don't know what I could have done. With the perfect view afforded by hindsight, I believe it is even possible that had I been fully aware of the created horrors, I would have cursed Rob and told him the guilt he suffered was as nothing compared to the sufferings of his creations. Perhaps I might not have been such a great help after all. In any case, I could not live for someone else.

Once I bolted my own front door and locked out everyone else, my real life began. The days at Genomex became unreal and dreamlike.

I was polite to Rob, which seemed to surprise him. He did not become a hermit; his life became increasingly chaotic. The Children of Genomex were entering puberty, many of them becoming strange, frightening people. I had heard only rumors at that time, but Rob knew almost everything Adam knew, and Rob was haunted.

He had a conscience, and he knew he had been a major part of the creation of a future nightmare for humanity. As the Genomex mutants matured, the full dreadfulness of the work Rob had done became clear. He could barely function at work.

I forced myself back to the here and now, and shifted into my corporate neutral voice. "And how might I help you, Rob?"

"What happened to everyone, Rebecca? You and Dr Varady are the only ones the receptionist could find listed in the corporate directory from the old technical staff."

I thought carefully about my reply before saying anything. "There was a major purge of personnel in the autumn of 2007. There are only three of us remaining who were on staff in spring of 2007."

He was silent for a moment. "What brought that on?"

"Security concerns." That was certainly true enough.

"Eckhart's doing?"

"Yes."

"He was always prone to excess."

I chuckled softly. "He was completely justified in doing what he did."

"What happened?"

"I'm afraid I cannot say anything about it, but I witnessed the events precipitating the purge."

"Rebecca, I know Genomex is hiring. I am desperate enough to beg for a job there."

O, relief! We've gotten down to business.

I must have felt guilty about past events. I agreed to meet him for lunch and discuss job possibilities. I met him at the bagel/sandwich shop sharing the same strip mall occupied by Ed's Buy and Fly, a shipping store with a collection of post office boxes, and a handful of other small stores, close enough to be considered walking distance in good weather or if one was not in a hurry.

I arrived early, before the typical lunch crowd. Rob was there ahead of me, already seated at a table, deeply enmeshed in reading. He did not notice my arrival.

"Rob."

Robert Abelmann visibly startled at the sound of my voice.

"Rebecca. I wasn't sure you would come. I'm glad you're here."

"What was that about? You must remember that I keep my promises."

"So many of my 'friends' from Genomex didn't want to talk to me after I left. It was an odd experience, as if I had suddenly become unclean. A lot of people suddenly weren't my friends any longer."

"I've never been like 'everyone else'. Now, tell me about your wanting to come back to Genomex."

"I cannot stand where I am working now. It's a horrible place. I'm desperate enough to want to come back. I've heard they're hiring."

"It's not the company you knew. Genomex is as clandestine as ever, but the overall direction is benign." I didn't think he would believe my claim.

"That's hard to believe." Rob laughed, predictably.

"With my sources, I'm sure." I had absolutely no doubts. After all, I not only knew what Mason was doing, I had an unofficial role in planning what Genomex did.

"I quit because the place was anything but benign. Waking up and going to work was like a full-time nightmare. Adam and Breedlove created monstrosities, one after the other, by the hundreds, probably thousands."

"Thousands. They made thousands. More of them are found every year. Adam and Breedlove had satellite operations no one here knew much about and which were hardly documented. The genes of the unborn were manipulated and tampered with at those outposts as well. No one bothered keeping accurate records. The total number of Genomex mutants may be staggering."

"You know?" Rob was shocked to find me well informed concerning matters he thought secret and well hidden.

"I do now. I didn't know in the 1990s, although there were always stories. But everything has changed. Laura Varady will tell you the same thing. Rob, I cannot get you hired, but I can get you an interview. Genomex has changed. A lot."

"Adam must be running things by now. I cannot imagine him changing anything. Adam liked things the way they were."

I smiled and shook my head. "Adam's been gone since 1998. To be honest, he hasn't been much missed. His technical contributions had fallen way off and clearly, his interest in Genomex projects decreased to the point of Paul Breedlove chewing him out in front of people for excessive time spent away from the job."

"I can't believe Adam's gone. Where'd he go?"

"That is a long story. The simplified version is that he set up an independent operation after dipping freely into Genomex funds. A few years back he was convicted of embezzlement."

"The Prince of Genomex a criminal!"

"It's true."

"Who's running things with Breedlove dead? Stockmeyer? Khaled? Mayakovsky?"

All good candidates, Rob, but all wrong.

"Eckhart."

"He isn't a technical person."

"That doesn't matter. He's been cleaning up after Breedlove and Adam since 2007, not furthering their agendas. At Genomex, those old agendas are dead. Very dead."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure. Sure as I am about very few things."

"I never knew what to think of Eckhart after the accident. He changed so much. Very spooky."

I paused for a moment, deciding whether or not to tell Rob the truth. It wasn't a secret any longer; why not tell him?

"'Incident X' was not an accident, but an attempted murder. Adam acted deliberately, and Paul Breedlove covered up for him."

Rob didn't look surprised. "I always thought so. I am surprised Adam never tried anything with me. I never made any secret of my doubts about the direction and nature of our research. I saw a lot of dreadful things done at Genomex, things even Breedlove did not like to remember, and took care to keep hidden. You cannot imagine."

"Yes, I can. I've seen many of them. Probably most of them."

Rob looked surprised. I could not imagine why.

"Rob, the sins of the past tend not to stay buried. They tend to fester, and eventually erupt like an overripe boil. For years, Mason Eckhart explored the paper records left by Adam, Breedlove—and you—and read them all, in the middle of the night. The security people owed their loyalty to him, after all; his snooping was never reported to Breedlove or Adam."

"I heard those records were conveniently destroyed."

"The originals are mostly gone, destroyed in the Archive fire in 2007. The microfilmed records of the laboratory notebooks remain safe and whole in a salt mine under Lake Erie."

Again, he looked surprised. There was nothing shocking or clandestine about such record duplication. Most corporations did protect their critical files in similar ways, records of far less sensational natures than genetic tampering.

"That's right. That's why we used black ink only."

I nodded. "After Adam left, Eckhart explored the sublevels beneath the surface. Late at night, when he couldn't sleep, he'd go exploring, and open up the sealed labs, the ones no one was meant to see again."

"You know this as fact?" Rob just couldn't believe I was so well informed.

"I know this as fact. The more horrible secrets of Genomex, the ones a hundred feet down behind steel doors covered with concrete, have been dug up and cremated. A committee including several religious people were shown some of the horrors and asked to develop respectful services. The remains were not sent to a landfill like trash. They were given a decent burial with clergy."

"How did these people know they were not being used to cover up Eckhart's work?"

You talk like someone who listened to Adam's stories and believed them.

"I serve on that committee. Breedlove dated his work carefully. The committee was shown documentation clearly proving Eckhart was not an employee when the worst of the work was performed. Had he been responsible, it would have made far more sense to shovel out the evidence and incinerate it clandestinely. That is not what happened. Rob, you must have known about some of that work in the sublevels."

Time to make you squirm, Rob.

"Of course I did. That's why I had to leave." Rob turned darkly serious. "Working at Genomex became a kind of waking nightmare. I lost my family. I almost lost myself. After you knew what went on there, how could you stay?"

"I was never, ever part of any group involved in actively creating Genomex mutants. Some of the work I did no doubt supported such activity, especially prior to 1998 when Adam departed, or as Adam described it, "escaped". But I never knowingly made mutants, Rob, and it took me years to even learn they existed."

"How did you find out?"

"I watched. I listened. There was a meeting with Adam during which he said a lot more than he should have, talking about 'adolescent mutants' and 'subdermal governors'. That was in 1995. In 2000, I saw my first mutant, a boy who could levitate."

"How widely did the existence of mutants become known at Genomex?"

"Not widely at all. I did not learn the details of the program until 2007. I met another mutant, an adult woman…with wings. She could fly, Rob. I saw her fly around the cafeteria, late at night. She did 'laps' up near the ceiling, strengthening her wings in a warm, secure place."

"Angela."

"Yes, Angela."

"What happened to her?"

"After taking a few circuits of the cafeteria, she told me she felt strong enough to leave, so, I took her to the rooftop. Well, she was human; I did not 'free' her, I only showed her a place from which she could conveniently depart."

"Did anyone know you did this?"

"Mason Eckhart."

"And you didn't get into trouble?"

"No. Angela wasn't a prisoner. She was a kind of guest. It's complicated, but I did not get into trouble for showing her the way to the roof."

Rob isn't ready for the whole of Angela's story.

"And you don't know what happened to her after that?"

"Well, yes, I do. A few years after, she started work at St Kats. She's still there."

"St Kats?"

"St Katherine's. The hospital Genomex funds for the treatment of medical problems of Genomex mutants."

Rob rolled his eyes at me in disbelief.

"No, Rob, it's not what you think. The horror show was not moved to another address. St Kats is a hospital, maybe the only one in the world where these people can openly go and freely discuss their symptoms. Angela is one of several MDs on staff who are mutants as well."

"Breedlove didn't set up this place, did he?"

"No. Paul Breedlove felt great guilt for what he had done, but he didn't do much to undo his work."

"Eckhart?"

"Yes."

"I'm not as surprised as a lot of people might be. The program disgusted him. He used to talk a lot about leaving Genomex before his injuries tied him to the place and to Breedlove."

"Rebecca, the jobs I've had to take…for a number of them I did not even admit to my doctorate. They never would have hired me. Lacking references made things difficult."

"I can imagine."

"I've worked in places so dangerous I thought operations like that had been regulated out of existence decades ago. I've seen things I thought impossible. I saw a 'waterfall' of cyclohexane once in the plant where I am working now."

"Sounds hellish. One spark, and you would have had Flixborough."

"Management doesn't care if anyone leaves the property in a body bag. Since they sell only to other corporations, public relations aren't a concern. They contract to make materials for other corporations, things other companies decide are too dangerous for exposure."

"What about the possibility of lawsuits from the victim's families? Wouldn't that inspire some common sense based caution?"

"Common sense is uncommon at this operation. One of the production workers burned his cornea when a line broke carrying 48 hydrobromic acid. The plant manager called him at home and asked him to come into work the next day so the plant would not have a reportable accident."

"The regulatory people must have been paid off. Nothing else makes sense."

"That's what everyone believes. There isn't any other explanation for the way things keep going wrong and nothing changes."

"I thought places like that didn't exist anymore."

"So did I, until I started working there. The plant emits a toxic blend of gasses from one of the reactors. The means of testing whether legal limits have been exceeded is to send a man up on the roof to stand 30 feet downwind of the exhaust. If he becomes nauseated, emissions are judged too high and production makes an adjustment."

"Scary."

"All of this goes on close to an elementary school and a housing development. Someday, with the right accident and wind direction…"

"Bhopal waiting to happen."

'Every time I leave the plant I think it will be my last, that the next time I drive to the plant there won't be anything left except a 500 meter crater."

"With good reason."

"Everyone who works production is in a state of sleep deprivation because of the shift changes. One guy fell asleep sitting on a forklift while wearing a full face respirator."

"He must have been exhausted."

"I have to get out of there. I'm doing rotating 12-hour shifts, 7 to 7. I never feel rested. I cannot get to sleep anymore without taking something. The only topic people want to talk about is how much sleep they're going to get on their days off. Everyone is sick all the time. I have to get away before my health is ruined, or I see one of the chemical operators leave the plant in a bag."

Rob looked desperate. I didn't doubt the truth of anything he told me. I didn't want to give him false hope.

"I'll do what I can to get you out of there, Rob, but I cannot promise anything because hiring decisions outside my area are beyond my influence. The people working in whatever group interviews you will make the decision."

"Rebecca, could we do dinner sometime?"

I wasn't expecting that. I felt as if I'd been ambushed and was angry with Rob for making me uncomfortable after I had gone out of my way to help him. I contained my anger, but just barely.

"Rob, I'm very married these days."

"Oh?"

And his tone made me angry, too. His assumption that I would be conveniently free was vexing.

"Anyone I might know?"

"As a matter of fact, yes." I paused, just to let him wonder for a moment. My turn to ambush Rob. "Mason."

"Mason Eckhart?"

I had seen this reaction before, but it had been awhile since I had had the pleasure of shocking someone I wanted to shock. I enjoyed watching Rob's face. Like a lot of people, he just did not believe it at first.

"The one, the only." I smiled. The less said sometimes, the better, and the greater the effect.

"I'm stunned. This is a joke, yes?"

"It's very real. As real as Flixborough."

People who knew me from the 1990s and early to mid 2000s at Genomex typically reacted as Rob did. After Incident X, no one thought of Mason as human, except Dr Varady. He worked hard to create that impression, which he maintained in large degree to this day. I did not aggressively defend him with "no, he isn't like that, not really," but stayed silent and let people wonder. Mason chose to present himself as he did in the workplace. What he was to his children, to me, and a handful of others, was personal and not the business of anyone else. I did not owe Rob or anyone an explanation of my relationship with Mason. I did not owe anyone an explanation.

"Where are you living?" he asked awkwardly.

"At Genomex. Mason doesn't have much choice, given his condition." I had forgotten how many people never gave any thought to where Mason slept, or if he slept. But once upon a time, I had never considered such pragmatic matters, either.

"But where?"

I wasn't sure how much to tell him. "There is an apartment onsite that accommodates Mason's health requirements. It's been there since early 1993."

1993. I had not done the arithmetic before, but for twenty years now, Mason had lived in that steel cavern when he wasn't working.

Calling it an "apartment" made it sound more normal than it was. I wasn't going to detail the UV lights that blasted the place when no one was there, the smooth stainless steel walls, floors, and ceilings that were easy to keep clean and would not support microbial growth, the laminated window, or the airlock entrance. I had never told my brother about these things. Steve would not understand. I didn't even want to explain how I lived, by my own choosing. Only Samihah knew.

"I never understood how Eckhart kept going…so the Prince of Genomex attempted murder, and nothing was done."

"Breedlove protected Adam. That's why he was never prosecuted. Mason was dependent upon Breedlove to stay alive. He had to accept that Adam would not be charged and tried. Breedlove tweaked and fine-tuned treatment from day to day. Nearly two years passed before Mason's condition stabilized and responded predictably."

"Adam always was a slippery character. He could justify doing anything in the lab. He would create one monstrosity, and instead of stopping there, he'd make eleven more just to try to prove he had not been wrong in the first place. If just one of the eleven was measurably better than the initial attempt, Adam would convince himself his work was progressing in the right direction. We argued a lot about the ethics of the work we were doing."

"Adam has been presenting himself as the savior of Genomex mutants. Fortunately, most of them now know Adam is to blame for the pain they've endured. Adam even formed a kind of cult he called 'Mutant X' that wasn't about helping mutants, but about Adam's guilt and need to be loved by his mistakes. Worst of all, it served his curiosity, since he continued his experiments. He created a dashing image of himself in mutant circles. Turning impressions around has not been easy. It's taken years."

"Adam believes his stories. That's what makes him such a good liar. His stories change to suit the circumstances."

"Did you have any contact with Adam after you quit Genomex?"

"He called me twice the first week I was gone, and asked me to come back. He promised he would make everything right with Breedlove, and that all traces of my resignation would be removed from my personnel records."

"That's quite an offer."

"That was just the first call. When he called again, he offered a large pay increase, 35 . Whatever our personal and ethical differences, he did want me to work there."

"And still you turned him down?"

"I had participated in making enough monsters. Where is Adam now? No ordinary prison, I'm sure."

I paused, unsure of how much to tell Rob.

"Adam lived bizarrely after leaving Genomex. He built a fortress-like stronghold under a mountain, and lived there with his mutant cult. He even had his own plane. None of this came cheaply. We're still not sure where all of the money came from."

"I was going to ask."

"Adam told people he made a lot of money in the crazy stock markets of the 1990s, and he did. Much of the money he originally invested was not his, however, but was siphoned out of Genomex."

"Adam was a dirty boy."

"And Mason knew it. Adam was serving time up until a few weeks ago when someone broke him out of prison."

"Broke him out?"

"Yes, and there hasn't been a hint or trace of him since. Several federal agencies are actively searching for him."

"Could he be with his mutant friends? His cult?"

"The Mutant X cult is gone. Two work for Mason, one has her own business, and another is in another prison for multiple robberies. Adam could be anywhere. He could even be dead."

"Adam's too flamboyant to stay hidden for long. If he's alive, Adam needs an audience."

All too true. Adam did not understand the concept of subtlety.

"I'd be wary of any vague, wildly well-paying job offers that come your way. Adam might be out there recruiting." I smiled, but I was only half-joking. Adam was capable of anything. Mason's people were in fact monitoring agencies and headhunters specializing in the recruitment of technical specialties Adam required to staff a small, elite research group.

After lunch, I gave Mason my impressions of Rob Abelmann.

"I did not see anything in his manner that would discourage me from hiring him."

"Rob was a brilliant man. Also, long ago and far away, my neighbor. So, you would recommend departments interview him?"

"With reservations. He's been through a lot. He should be given a background check as complete and invasive as one given a new hire, including an examination by Emma."

"Coming from you, that is a little harsh."

"Rob's been through some hard times. He's brilliant, but we have no way of knowing just how far down he descended. At some point he lost everything and had to start over again. From what he said, he's never been able to approach being what he was at Genomex. He's not quite the same man."

"None of us are the same people we were in those days."

"No. I won't say he's a broken man but the past weighs heavily on him. We should sort through his past carefully, and be wary of possibilities such as substance abuse. Oh, I didn't see any signs of anything, but he's been through a lot."

"Fair enough. We'll be thorough. Perhaps working here would be good for him. Serious work has serious curative properties."

"Perhaps. We have to be careful who comes through the front doors. Mason, Rob brings to mind some bad memories of mine."

"What? He discovered you inadvertently rinsed a pipette jar fewer times than you prefer?" Mason smiled.

I wished I could smile back, but I could not bring myself to do it. I couldn't hide my discomfort from Mason, nor was I trying to hide anything from him.

"Did Rob Abelmann do something to you?"

People who know only Mason's Genomex persona find it difficult to believe just how protective he could be. Deeply wounded himself, he hated to see anyone he cared about hurt in any way.

"No, the truth is, I could have behaved better towards him."

"No one here has to look at him. Getting him an interview isn't about taking care of your own guilt, is it?"

"No, it isn't. Eliminating him from consideration because of my wishes is unfair, and he could be valuable here. He worked cheek by jowl with Adam and Breedlove. His insights could be useful to the effort of undoing some of the damage."

"I cannot imagine you behaving badly towards anyone."

"Well, these was not my most shining moments, Mason. I've learned a lot since then."

"So have I."

Mason

I have done terrible things.

I try to block the memories from becoming too active. Adam can absolve himself of the genetic obscenities committed at Genomex by claiming he knew nothing of the application of his work. That is a lie, of course; Adam and Breedlove headed the program. For the twenty years Adam was at Genomex, he knew everything.

Unlike Adam, I cannot tell myself a lie and transform myself into a victim. I did not create the monsters, but for years I protected them, unknowingly at first, but with growing knowledge for many years until Adam's botched attempt at murder made my leaving Genomex impossible. Hellish memories were all there, just below the surface. If I reflected too much upon my acts, I would be of no use to anyone, not to my children, not to Rebecca, not to myself, and not to all the genetic anomalies I was trying to keep from eventually destroying humanity.

Some of the people to whom I did dreadful things deserved what happened to them. Emma did not deserve what happened to her.

Never in all the years I ran the GSA had I done anything to someone I considered a friend. Yes, I had once considered Paul Breedlove a friend, but that changed when he blocked prosecution of Adam for the attempt on my life. Adam should have been charged and convicted, but Paul wouldn't have that.

Paul's fixation upon Adam as the only way any of the programs could go forward was purely emotional, I decided some years after. Rob Abelmann and Breedlove could have carried on without Adam. But Adam was Breedlove's 'son', and Paul was slow to admit to his child's weaknesses and failings.

I cooled towards Paul Breedlove. I needed Breedlove's expertise and dedication to keep me alive, but his failure to deal with Adam's attempt on my life destroyed the personal respect I had for the man. After discovering what and who Paul had been decades before in Germany, all of my self-control was required merely to be civil to him. My respect for Paul as a person and a professional vanished.

He had willingly served under some of the most infamous men of the twentieth century, participating in what they had the effrontery to call 'medical experiments'. Paul's hands were soaked in the blood of uncounted innocents, including children. If he wanted to atone for his crimes, he should have taken his skills and practiced medicine in places lacking doctors.

Instead, he made mutants, thousands of them, who cumulatively spelled the doom of humanity. Finally realizing what a mess he had made, he prepared to confess his sins to the world. He had to be silenced before his guilt added public chaos to his catalogue of crimes.

I did not know what to do about Emma. Emma and Jesse I both considered good friends. My affection for them was deep and genuine. I would have done almost anything for them, including a number of illegal acts. I kept Jesse in mind as someday becoming my successor. Who better than a Genomex mutant to understand the GSA mission and the necessity for it?

When the test results came back from St Kats and confirmed my fears that Emma was carrying a daughter with all the abilities of both parents, I knew there was one thing I could not do for Emma and Jesse, and that was allow their daughter to be born. I could not have that bloodline go on.

I almost talked to Rebecca about this. As rational as she was, I doubted she would be able to step back from her emotions, not on this matter. I had trouble sorting this out because of my emotions. I could talk to Rebecca about anything…except this. So, I formed a plan in my mind without consulting anyone.

Maybe I should have talked to Rebecca, anyway. Acting without discussion was not a good idea.

I hated my plan. I loathed myself for being able to think in such terms. My self-loathing brought on by past sins would deepen if I carried out my plan. Further, I knew the personal costs to me were going to be heavy, if not devastating. Rebecca might abandon me. Certainly many other people would.

I weighed the factors over and over, talking myself into the need for personal sacrifice to keep Jessica Anne Kilmartin from existing. Raised by those parents, Jessica very likely would be an exceptional individual, exceptionally intelligent, and exceptionally principled and responsible. But she'd carry her Genomex Taint, possibly bequeath that taint to others, and in just a few generations, to many others.

I could fool other people, but not Rebecca. She knew I was preoccupied with something but she thought it was Adam dominating my thoughts. There was little about Adam to consider. I had no information about him following his escape. The helicopter had been tracked from the prison and found—in forty feet of water.

Adam craved attention. That he had not surfaced in his usual unsubtle fashion was odd and disturbing. Something had changed. Had the man at long last gotten past the need for approval and learnt caution and restraint? Adam? Not a chance.

"Adam is out there somewhere. Eventually, he will surface."

"Maybe you got lucky and Adam now sleeps with the fishes."

Rebecca was using her Credibility Voice, but that only worked in technical presentations, not with me. She did not really believe Adam went down with the helicopter. She was only trying to keep me from worrying over Adam until he surfaced. Rebecca knew well as I that Adam was like a toothache. The pain might come and go for a time, but the pain would always come back, eventually requiring action.

"Maybe he does. I'm due for some luck." Did she know I was humoring her? I don't know. She probably did. Rebecca's concern for my well-being was genuine and of long-standing. I wasn't about do say or do anything to slight or diminish that concern. "Realistically, whoever blasted Adam out of prison probably planned the exit flight with consummate care, and would like the searchers to believe the trail ends ten meters down."

"That's an expensive piece of hardware to toss away into the water."

I nodded. "Adam never spares any expense. He's the one who built the Zen hideaway with a meditation pool and garden in the middle of a mountain." How typically 'Adam' Sanctuary had been: grandiose, impractical, poorly sited, all while he gave his followers an allowance, as if they were no more than children. Well, Brennan was a case of failure to mature—but evidence indicated he supplemented his allowance with petty thievery. Adam never wondered where Brennan got the money for his fleet of rusty old cars?

"Just thinking about living and sleeping with millions of tons of rock over my head makes me claustrophobic. I don't like driving through tunnels."

"Adam hid like a rat in the sewers. I don't know how convinced anyone to stay down there with him. Sanctuary was dank, musty, and chilly. Water seeped in constantly."

"Which made it so easy to destroy. Turn off the dehumidifiers and the pumps, and the place filled with water. How could Adam have been so foolish in site selection?"

Briefly, I relished the memory of the destruction of Sanctuary. After removing the electronics and scientific hardware, much of which belonged to Genomex and still had Genomex property tags attached, restoring any personal items and taking every record we could find, Jesse and I went through the entire facility, turning off the dehumidifiers and pumps that kept Sanctuary livable. Then we left in no great hurry. Sanctuary required about nine days for the underground river to put everything under water.

With Adam locked away in prison, I wanted to be certain he would not have his Zen rathole to hide in should he ever be paroled.

I'm not inclined towards destructive acts, but in this case, putting Sanctuary under water made a good deal of sense. Lacking his Zen nest, where was Adam hiding?

Rebecca's voice brought me back to the discussion.

"Adam wasn't perfect. Breedlove did a good job constructing him, but Adam was not perfect. He was never pragmatic. Consider the way he handled ground transportation: for a time he used cars without plates. Police notice those. All he had to do was create some corporate fiction and register his cars in the company name. But Adam didn't do that. Then, when he did begin driving cars with plates, he drove expensive cars, cars a good many people would notice. Adam just did not think through possibilities in a practical way."

Emma, I owe you my life. How can I even consider the plans I am making for you?

"Lilith is probably an improvement on the original design. She did her work and very little else, unlike Adam who required constant adulation from someone, anyone."

And Jesse, this will destroy Jesse.

"Breedlove would not have built a second android if he didn't believe the next would be better than the first. Paul did not waste effort."

"Lili was always quiet and unobtrusive, but she did not appear unusually close to Breedlove. Now I know why."

"So much going on beneath the surface," I said, absently.

So much going on now, just out of sight. When I have done this thing, will Rebecca ever speak to me again? Will I have anyone left to me?

"All corporations are like this. The only differences are the stories and the darkness of the secrets. My brother Steve has a lot of corporate war stories." She paused. "Mason? Are you okay?"

"Yes…I need to be slightly more careful in my choice of whole foods. I'll be fine."

Rebecca was too astute to be put off by this. I wasn't given to whining, and she wasn't given to nagging, so she'd observe me carefully, and then decide whether my stoicism was overruling my generally good sense.

After tomorrow, will Rebecca give a damn whether I am alive or dead?

I could not be sure. But I was certain that if I waited any longer, I would lose my nerve to act.

I delayed acting as long as I dared, shipping Jesse across country to a conference, conveniently getting him out of the way for a few days. I assembled all the people I required, all the skills and expertise. For bodyguards that morning, I selected a pair of psionics from a Gulf coast office. They were not as gifted as Emma; no one was as gifted as Emma. This pair would be able to detect her attacks, if things came to that. I prayed they would not.

Casually, oh so casually, I stopped by Dr Varady's office and asked Emma if she could see me in 15-30 minutes. She suspected nothing. Rebecca's birthday was approaching, and if Emma suspected anything, she suspected that. I certainly tried to think of Rebecca to put Emma off the scent of what I was planning.

This is the most hideous thing you have ever contemplated.

Emma all but floated into my office. She was content, healthy-looking, at peace with herself, the world, Jesse…and she liked me. She trusted me.

Emma was more than an employee, more than a friend. She was my almost-daughter, just as Jesse was my almost-son. I cared for them as I cared for few people. They were loyal to me, and I to them. They had once been my sworn enemies, and after today I would not be surprised if either of them tried to kill me.

I almost wished she had sensed my duplicity in Varady's office, run away from Genomex and me. But no, here she was, smiling and cheerful.

Why do I always have to do the most terrible things? How can I do this to Emma?

"Is this about Rebecca's birthday?" I've already thought some about that. I've got some good ideas."

"No."

Emma was silent for a long moment, recognizing something old and familiar in my voice, something she had not heard in years and something she believed she would never hear again. Something cold, unfeeling, and terrifying.

"What is this about?"

But she was suspicious. Too late for that. Her suspicions would not save her now.

"This child of yours—have you considered the possible consequences for society?"

Still the cold, commanding voice. Emma looked confused, deep trust conflicting with old instinct and memory.

"Yes. But I don't think Jesse and I will raise a barbarian."

"I agree. What about her grandchildren?" Who will control them?"

Emma was a highly intelligent woman…but she was thinking with her emotions. "I hadn't thought that far ahead."

"I have. Emma, you and Jesse are wonderful people, but surely you must understand that your abilities are too dangerous to be passed on, perhaps in greater numbers every generation."

"Mason, what are you saying?"

"I'm asking you to voluntarily end this pregnancy." I was slipping backwards in time, into a persona I thought I had abandoned with the people I cared about.

"Jesse and I want this daughter very much. We want a family."

"And you will make wonderful parents…but not of this child."

"Mason, I won't do that."

"I would use every ounce of influence I possess to hasten an adoption. You wanted that before."

"But, everything's changed. I want my child. Jesse's child. I believed I'd never have that. Maybe we'll adopt another, but we want Jessica."

Her mind was made up and I was not going to persuade her otherwise. Just the same, I had to give her every opportunity, if only to convince myself there was no avoiding this betrayal of a truly good woman.

"You're very sure? I cannot change your mind?"

"Mason, no. I don't even want to talk about it anymore."

I sat in silence for a moment. Once you set things in motion, there is no recalling it. Everything changes.

Using a prearranged signal, I summoned the pair of psionics who did not know Emma. Before she could focus energy, one of the agents seized her while the other implanted her with a governor.

Emma screamed in agony. I will never forget that scream.

"Mason! What are you doing? Are you crazy?"

My betrayal was reflected in her eyes. I said nothing, knowing if I talked to her my resolve would collapse. I owed Emma my life, and everything good that had come my way since Emma released me from stasis was because of her. What I had planned for her was cruel beyond thought.

Only a monster could think of this. Only a worse monster could do it.

"Does Rebecca know about this?"

I stood at my desk and shook my head.

No, if Rebecca knew, she would have shot me, the GS agents and gotten you out of here. She would conclude I was insane.

They injected Emma with a powerful sedative. A third agent pushed a wheel chair into my office. At first they grabbed at her roughly, like so much dead weight.

"Be gentle with her. She is not a criminal. She has done nothing wrong."

I walked over to the wheelchair. She looked up at me with shining, glassy eyes. "What have I done, Mason?" I could not look at those eyes.

"Get her down to the infirmary. They should be ready for her."

"Mason?"

I had planned on staying in my office. I've seen more than I wish of medical technology. The smell of such places brings to mind too many bad memories, close brushes with death. But I couldn't allow Emma to go alone into that place.

I avoided looking at her, but took up her left hand in mine, and that way, Emma was brought to surgery, with me walking beside her.

Mason Eckhart, you are going directly, straight to Hell someday.

I had brought in a team of doctors and other medical personnel. I knew none of them and they did not know me. They were all going to be paid cash at day's end. There are so many disappointing people in this world. How such people sleep at night I do not know. I may have a dark history, but I never sold my services.

First, do no harm…

A needle was inserted into one of Emma's veins. I bent down close to her head as the fluid flowed into her, and whispered, "I am so sorry, Emma. I don't know if you can hear me, I am sorry."

She was quickly gone. I let go of her hand and stood up, watching her being wheeled away. I wanted to scream at them to bring her back, but held silent, thinking of generations I would never know.

I waited outside until they were done. I wasn't going to accomplish anything in my office, and I didn't want to talk to anyone.

To save the world for millions –billions—of children yet to be born, I must stop this one child from being born. How arrogant, grandiose –and yes, pompous- that sounds! But it is true. They why do I know I've just done cold-blooded murder of Jessica Anne? Why did they have to give her a name?

I closed my eyes, but I knew I wasn't going to sleep, even though I had not slept well in weeks, even with medication. I was exhausted, and felt unwell, as if on the edges of an infection. How long until I will be able to sleep again?

I almost called Rebecca down to the infirmary to be with me, but I resisted that impulse. Two times I set aside the telephone. As well as I knew her, I was uncertain of her reaction to this.

Everyone I knew would be horrified and angry with me. But I knew that when the day began, and proceeded despite my reasonable projections of what specific individuals would think.

Why me? Because I have the stomach to do what is necessary. Others see the need plainly but could never act.

This was an internal dialogue of long-standing.

Am I only pasting an heroic rationalization over a nasty job no one should be doing? Am I no more than an unpleasant man striving to think well of himself?

There was never a resolution to this dialogue, and never a finish.

Rebecca was subtle enough, but she wanted me to retire. She knew the price I paid staying in the job. With two of us living under the Genomex roof, we had set aside a fortune. I would be able to build my house, complete with upper deck housing my telescope, and we could live quietly, not agonizing over the fate of humanity, just writing our books, the primary excitement provided by visiting children and grandchildren.

At this moment, such a life seemed idyllic, but realistically, it was attainable. What's holding you back? You've served here twenty-nine years –attending to your duties above and beyond reasonable expectation. Let someone else cope with this nightmare, this slow-motion plague. Most likely, several people will be required to do what you have done alone.

I looked down at my gloved hands. I'd worn gloves like these since I was thirty years old. I must have gone through a few thousand pairs of them. How strangely my life has played out. How fortunate I am for the good that has come to me, despite my condition.

Leaving Genomex was an attractive prospect, and I knew perfectly well that my mission of identifying the Genomex mutants and minimizing the transmission of their DNA to the future would not and could not be completed by me. This was a multigenerational mission, and possibly, impossible.

You're a fool, Mason Eckhart. By forcing Emma to have this abortion and be sterilized, you've put your personal happiness at risk. After what Rebecca has endured with her failed pregnancies, can you imagine her reacting with other than horror and disgust? You weren't easy to get along with when you were normal. Ask Jackie. Rebecca saw worth in you no one else perceived. She patiently made all manner of adjustments to accommodate you. She has never complained, not once. Other women of less character would have resented time spent with Grey, Michele, and Deidre, but not her. She befriended Catherine and helped her blossom from underachieving teeny bopper to promising, intellectual young woman.

And now, you would risk losing her?

Yes. Duty demands sacrifice.

I sat with Emma in recovery. I'm not a nice man, but I remain an honorable one. I had done something unspeakably evil to Emma. I wasn't going to pretend it never happened or attempt to shift responsibility to someone else, not as Adam would do.

I owed Emma no less than my life. I had repaid her by destroying her daughter.

Emma finally opened her eyes. "Are you here to gloat?"

She startled me. I hadn't been watching her.

"No. Would you like some water?" I deserved her harsh tone, but did not respond to it.

"I would."

I poured a glass of water, then handed it to her. She took a few sips, then handed it back to me.

"Then, why are you here?" she asked.

"To be sure you came through this ordeal, and to do this." I held up a governor extractor.

"You're going to remove my governor?" she said, disbelieving.

"I wanted to do this myself. If you'll tilt your head forward…"

She looked puzzled. "Very well." She leaned forward.

I stood over her, and extracted the governor. Fortunately, the removal process was painless. "It's done." I threw the used governor into a trash bin and returned to my chair.

"You know you can't control me now." She sounded angry, hurt, betrayed, as well she should. But she wasn't afraid of me with the governor gone. I was not sure what I felt.

"Of course I know."

"I could kill you with a thought."

Emma could do that, and make death lingering and painful.

"Is that what you want to do? That is what I deserve."

She thought about that for a moment. I had come to this hour prepared to die. My will was updated and a farewell letter written to Rebecca.

"Guilt is eating you up, isn't it?"

"Of course it is."

"How could you begin to understand…but you do, don't you?" Emma read the emotions surrounding Rebecca's lost children, and my older children, lost to me physically for years.

"I believe I understand as well as any man is able. Rebecca has lost three of my babies."

"I did not know. How could you do this to me?"

"With difficulty. I am sorry…for you both. An adulthood spent doing the difficult and distasteful did not prepare me. This is the most hideous act I have committed, and I've committed more than a few. I could not allow this child to be born, to possibly bequeath dangerous talents to future generations."

"You're sincere."

She wasn't completely surprised to learn that.

"Yes. Emma, I considered you a friend. I have never had many of those, and the ones I have I value highly. I am not in the habit of betraying them."

She closed her eyes and thought in silence, taking in my emotions, sorting them, weighing them. I could not hide the truth from her, nor did I wish to do so. I wanted her to know. Then she opened her eyes. "I'm not going to kill you. I'm going to let you live with your guilt."

"If I had not earned my way to hell before, this assures me where I'm bound. I am not fool enough to believe there is any way to atone for this deed, but I care for you as I do for my daughters. If there is ever anything I can do for you, I will do it."

She knew I was telling the truth, without exaggeration and with every intention of delivering on that promise, whenever she asked.

"Mason, you must be cursed," she said softly.

"I think I must be." I rose from my chair.

"Am I a prisoner here?" she asked.

I shook my head. "I ask that you stay overnight, but if you really prefer to go home, I'll provide nurses to stay with you."

"I'll stay."

"Emma, you have no idea how sorry I am."

"Yes, I do."

"I'm going to go tell Rebecca what I've done, and pray she does not leave me."

"She might, you know."

"Yes. I know."

Emma waited a moment before saying more. "I hope she doesn't."

"Thank you."

For Emma to wish me well in any way after the atrocity I committed against her was the truest measure of the kind of friendship I had destroyed.

Rebecca

Typically during a workday Mason and I had few personal contacts. Maintaining this separation preserved some illusion of separate lives. At the end of a workday, we didn't already know the other's day. A lot of people at Genomex had no idea we were married and I preferred things that way lest people think I had been handed my position rather than earned it, and to discourage anyone from fawning over me in hopes of gaining favor with Mason.

This arrangement worked well, and provided unexpected humor if some hapless, unknowing soul told a story or joke about Mason in my presence. He inspired quite a mythology. Most of the stories were absurd and amusing if you knew the truth. Without naming names, I repeated these to Mason. The hurtful, cruel stories I kept to myself. He didn't need to hear them. There were a lot of these, but they had been worse in 2007 and before.

When Mason sent email asking me to meet him in our quarters immediately, I knew something terrible had happened. This was his way of handling bad news. We retreated behind steel doors to keep out everyone else, to cope with reality in private. He knew I hated showing vulnerability in front of coworkers, although my personal control did not approach his own. I worried that my sister-in-law Sherri had called with bad news about my brother Steve. I worried about Mason's children; they were all strong, healthy individuals but accidents could happen anytime. In the blink of an eye, all of your life can change forever.

I half-walked, half-ran to our quarters. Mason was there waiting. Never particularly healthy looking, the strain on his face told me a great deal before he said anything.

"Rebecca, this morning I did something terrible. I promised you once that you would have no more darkness to bear from me. I have broken that promise. I weighed the act with care and reflection. I did not act rashly."

A lot of people believed Mason had no conscience, an idea fostered by Adam's insistence that Mason was a sociopath. If anyone fit that description, it was Adam.

Mason had a conscience, an exquisitely fine-tuned one. He also had a sense of duty that could override his conscience. Mason's sense of duty allowed him to perform the dirty work required by his job, protecting the larger society from the excesses of the Genomex mutants and preserving human civilization by preventing, or at least delaying a genetic plague. Nevertheless, that did not mean Mason had a clear conscience. O, no.

"This is going to be bad, isn't it?" I asked. I did not really need to ask. I could read the answer in his eyes.

"Yes."

Mason was at once the best and the worst man I had ever known. The irony was that the same character traits drove him to both extremes.

I walked up to him, took a gloved hand in mine and led him to the cool, dark quiet of the bedroom. I threw my labcoat in the floor and didn't worry about the escaping change from the pockets. I discarded my shoes and crawled beneath the comforter.

"If I'm going to be traumatized, at least I'm going to be comfortable, and warm."

I didn't have to prompt him to join me. What worried me was his clinging, tense hold. This was very bad news.

"I could not allow Emma's child to be born. This morning, I had her seized, sedated, her daughter aborted, and a tubal ligation performed so this will never happen again."

I felt like a sledgehammer dropped on my heart.

The rest of my life is changed, divided into the time before I knew of this, and the time after.

I processed the information, and its implications, all personally negative. "Given our history, how could you destroy this child?"

"With difficulty."

"Why didn't you talk to me before doing this?"

"I thought there was a fair chance you would talk me out of it."

"I would have tried. You could not make a single exception?"

"A child combining the genetics of walking through walls and telempathy is just too dangerous. The bloodline had to end. I had Dr Lee at St Kats perform tests so I would know without question what qualities Emma's baby possessed. Before doing this horrible thing, I gathered and weighed facts. Jessica Anne would have had the talents of both parents, and she would have been healthy enough to reach adulthood."

"The logic of the deed is flawless, but Emma, Emma saved you from oblivion."

"And look what I have done to her."

"Would you have done this to Catherine?"

"Yes. To my own child and grandchild, I would do this. One of the primary criteria I used to make this decision was whether I could do the same to my own daughter."

If Mason believed a particular act was necessary to achieve a required goal, I was convinced he could steel himself to do it. There are times when distasteful deeds are required to keep societies whole. Mason was one of the men who could do these necessary and terrible deeds.

Yes, you could do this very same thing to Catherine. You could not be inconsistent.

I had not blundered blindly into this relationship. I knew very well what Mason was, probably better than anyone else. I knew his crimes; he had confessed them to me. I had not cast him aside after the telling but took the poison into my own heart, sharing some part of the weight he carried.

I would not abandon him now. He didn't need to tell me he feared my leaving him; the matter had come up before.

I turned to face him. Over years, I had disciplined myself not to do the things so natural for others, such as facing him at close range. But this was an extraordinary day, and I could not hold to the rules.

I suspect that if my resident flora was going to make you sick, by now it would have done so. Just this once, I'll break the rules.

"I'm not going anywhere, Mason. I'm horrified, but I'm not going anywhere."

He was drawn up into a fetal curl, eyes closed to shut out miserable reality. I kissed the top of his white head.

I stayed with Mason a long time. There was little else to say but he did not want to be left alone, and I was unready to face the world of Genomex. Eventually, I fed him a sedative and told him I'd be back after seeing Emma.

Lilith

Adam did not want to believe Paul Breedlove built a second creature like himself, an improved model. Where else could I have come from?

For days, Adam was in denial, irritable and not at all grateful for the risks I had taken and the fortune expended to free him from prison. Of course, I did not need to keep Adam if he became too unpleasant. I would never have broken him out of prison without a plan to rid myself of him, should that need arise. Adam knew nothing about that. Smugly sure of himself, he was likely working through plants to take Haven for himself and dispose of me.

While describing some of the finer points of my research, Adam expressed puzzlement at my egg-harvesting program.

"Well, Adam, in you Breedlove took great pains to make you indistinguishable from an ordinary human being. You can even consume food, although you cannot digest it, but this does make socializing with humans easier. He made you fully functional, taking some of his own testicular tissue as the basis for growing your own.

"That's wild."

"It's true. You can review the original data anytime you wish. I don't think Paul made you this way for your own benefit, however. I think he was acting to spread his own genetic material far and wide."

"That's a fantastic story."

"Some fantastic stories prove to be utterly true. This is one of them."

Adam rolled his eyes at me.

You will come to accept all of this as true.

"What about you?" he asked. "What are you, Eleanor re-created?"

"I am based on her mitochondria, but I am the result of a fusion of the DNA of hundreds of people. Breedlove took the best from all his employees over the years. Do you know what he gave me analogous to your own functionality?"

"I have no idea."

"Nothing! Nothing at all. He left me sterile, like a mule!"

I surprised myself with my own vehemence.

"Not even Breedlove was good enough to fabricate artificial human ova."

"No, but he did try to use mammalian eggs from various species, first extracting the native DNA, and then inserting human DNA, and eventually, DNA like mine, a fusion."

"Some of the mutants were created that way."

"Exactly. It's old technology, Adam. I'm surprised you didn't know about this work."

I was beginning to realize Adam knew far less than his reputation implied, and that I was still angry with Paul for leaving me…a mule.

Mason

The sedative Rebecca fed me was strong, but it could not keep me in a stupor indefinitely. While she was gone, I woke up and had to move around after so many hours detached from reality. No matter how distasteful reality was, it was the only reality I would ever have.

I felt dizzy as soon as I stood up, and had to brace myself against the wall for a moment before walking out of the bedroom. I was unsteady on my feet. I was familiar with the side effects of this sedative, and I knew what was happening was not caused by the medication. I hoped the symptoms would cease before Rebecca returned, because she would fret even if she said nothing. I had lived with the fact that hardly anyone cared what happened to me, but I knew that Rebecca did. I hated admitting any frailties to her, not wanting her to worry.

Outside, things were grey and wet. A closer look would only deepen my depression, so I went directly to my computer.

Nearly all the email was routine and could wait for morning and more thoughtful replies. What caught my eye was an email from Catherine with multiple attachments. Email from Catherine was not unusual but she rarely sent pictures. The subject line was the mundane 'Thursday greetings':

Mason,

I don't want to state here where I found the attached material, but I think it's important. I sent the originals to you by overnight air, but scanned them first so you could review this material as early as possible. I may have found something recently lost.

C.

Already, Catherine was learning to be careful of the kind of records she left.

How formidable you will be.

Initially, I was puzzled by the scanned images, because they seemed to be the pages of a pamphlet promoting a religious cult, hardly Catherine's style.

Temple of the Chosen Few. Why do these fringe cults always believe they alone have a direct line to God? Does God become angry with such arrogance?

The language was written to appeal to lonely lost souls, societal misfits, but a careful reading made clear that the true target of the Temple was the lonely lost soul Genomex mutant. Even this was hardly unique; some mainstream faiths in locations with a number of mutants or mutant progeny had attempted outreach programs, since mutants tended to be confused and troubled.

I had quietly informed people operating such outreach programs of the existence of St Kats, careful to never suggest I was looking for names. I was not hunting names, but I wasn't being entirely altruistic, either, since I still pursued a program of suppressing the reality of the existence of mutants. Many mutants had serious medical problems and no idea how to receive treatment since most doctors would refer them to mental health specialists if they honestly described symptoms. Having an ailing Genomex mutant lose control of their talents while locked in a mental ward served neither the mutant nor my program.

I did not know of any other cult-like organization attempting to gather mutants except Ashlocke's now-defunct organization. This 'temple' was probably worth watching.

The florid language required great patience to wade through, but even though I tried to read it all, my eyes skipped to the bottom of the page, which Catherine had faintly highlighted.

"Sister Lilith and Brother Adam invite you to join the Higher Humanity in the Temple of the Chosen Few."

Very good, Catherine.

Adam had been a not completely legitimate scientist, with more than a whiff of the charlatan and huckster about him. Mutant X had possessed many cult characteristics. So, why not leap directly past the science into a cult to gain the adoration he so craved from the people whose misery he had created? Why trouble with the scientific sideshow?

Now, how does one find Sister Lilith and Brother Adam? What earthly good are these lofty saviors if one cannot contact them?

Rebecca

The Genomex Infirmary was not a place for the removal of splinters and dispensing bandaids and aspirin. It was a miniature hospital, set up to keep Mason alive. The obscenity performed on Emma had been done in complete safety with state of the art technique and technology.

The rent-a-nurse on duty first tried to block my entry, but relented after I told her I was Mr Creepy's wife. Association with Mason could be useful. I could not identify her accent. Mason said staff had been brought in just for this, people who did not know him, people who did not know Emma, or even Genomex. She followed me into the room where Emma was, and deposited herself in one of the chairs. I hadn't expected that.

"Could we have some privacy?" I glared at the nurse, and she silently rose from her chair and left the room, noiselessly closing the door.

Emma had been dozing. She opened her eyes as I pushed a chair close to the bed and sat down.

"He told you."

"He told me what he did to you. Emma…if I had had any idea Mason was planning this, I would have gotten you away from him myself. I would have stopped him myself, somehow." I meant that.

"Thank you, Rebecca."

I shook my head. "He talks to me about everything. I don't know why he keep this inside. There was no suggestion this was coming. Lately he has seemed preoccupied but I thought his health and Adam's escape were on his mind. I should have known. I really should have known he would do something."

"I read him. He sincerely believes he did the right thing."

"So he told me, at some length. He believes it. He said he would have done the same to Catherine, which I think is true. Mason did not do this lightly. He's a mess right now, and I'm worried about him."

"At first, I thought maybe he had fooled all of us, for years, but no, nothing so simple. I don't envy him. I don't envy you."

"Can I do anything for you?"

"I can't think of anything now."

"If you need to talk, I'll listen. Any time. I understand, more than you know. Much more than you know. I've lost three babies."

"Mason told me."

That surprised me. Mason was an intensely private person, and I did not think he would share those painful memories with anyone else.

"I'm surprised he shared that. He usually cannot talk about them."

"So am I. He feels intense emotion about those babies."

"Emma…I'm not sure I can stay with him. I don't know if I can trust him."

"He has made himself the person Adam always claimed he was."

Emma was right.

"Mason has poisoned everything now. He may have destroyed most of the good he's accomplished the last half-dozen years. He's done horrible things you know nothing about. He confessed them to me so I would know exactly what I was getting myself into. He promised he would never do anything so terrible again. I was convinced he was beyond those acts. Now, I know he isn't."

"By doing this to me, he betrayed you, too, didn't he?"

I nodded. "If I trust him again, it won't be the same. I'm sorry, Emma. I shouldn't come here and tell you my troubles."

"That's okay, Rebecca; our troubles have the same source."

"Who else knows?" Should I be trying to keep the story from getting out? If people did not know…

"No one else but Dr Varady. That nurse was brought in after the operation. She doesn't speak much English; I'm not sure where she's from."

"I have cousins who are attorneys. They would help you find someone here to go after Genomex legally."

I shocked myself saying that. Already I was distancing myself from Mason. An hour before he was the love of my life. What was he now? I wasn't sure. I could not be sure. I was going to have to think very hard about that. I wasn't going to abandon him, but I was not sure I could love him.

Emma shook her head. "I doubt that would work. Mason is very good at covering up the sins of Genomex. He's had a lot of practice. Whatever he does, it won't be public and it will be quiet and compelling. I expect I'll be offered some incredible amount of cash. I think I'll take it and move at least a thousand miles away to a mountaintop or somewhere in the middle of nothing, and make jewelry the rest of my life. No mutants, no Genomex ever again."

Could he buy you, Emma?

I wasn't sure if he would be buying, or if Emma was being pragmatic. Nothing changes what's done; only the future can be altered. Perhaps taking a settlement would not be so terrible a thing. Perhaps taking the money was the wisest and most positive possibility.

"What about Jesse?"

"I don't know what he'll say."

"Have you tried to reach him?"

"Not yet. I'm not going to tell him on the phone, anyway. I'll have him come home early, and tell him in person."

"Mason has done a lot to make the lives of Genomex mutants better…more than Adam ever did. St Kats and all the good things are at risk. Are you going to tell anyone else? I'm not talking about protecting Mason, I'm talking about salvaging the good."

"I don't know if I can keep this to myself."

"Remember what it was like before St Katherine's, before mutants came out of hiding. That's all worth protecting."

"You're right."

"St Kats is set up for operation long after we're all gone. There will still be mutants who will need it then."

"I won't tell anyone. But I don't know what Jesse will do."

"Talk to him."

"You're a good friend, Rebecca. I won't forget you, even on my mountain. I think you would have talked Mason out of doing this. And you know what is the oddest thing of all? I think he wishes you had. He could live with that."

"Now, he has to live with something much worse."

"Could you get Laura for me? Unless he's told you not to."

I smiled faintly. "Even if he had, I would anyway."

Mason

I was so intent upon Catherine's data that I did not look up when Rebecca returned.

"You're awake." Clearly she had expected me to sound asleep.

"Yes…I think…Catherine may have found Adam."

"How?"

I pointed to the screen. "The combination of Sister Lilith and Brother Adam has to be unique, doesn't it, especially with a sales pitch crafted to be alluring to Genomex mutants?"

"I would think yes." She came and stood behind me, reading the material. "Higher Humanity. How humble."

"Rebecca, I'm not going to lightly ask how Emma is feeling. I don't need to ask to know she feels like Hell. My not asking does not mean I don't care or that I have pushed aside the damage done."

She said nothing at first, then placed her hands on my shoulders. "I know that. Asking in a lightweight fashion would make me wonder what was going on inside your head. However else people may damn you, they will never effectively accuse you of superficiality."

They'll never say that about you, either.

"Thank you."

"It's truth. Now, what is this silliness about the Higher Humanity?"

"A not atypical cult appeal to the lost and lonely souls among college-attending mutants. Being young is difficult enough; being young with freakish abilities, poorly understood, must be far worse."

"So, Lilith and Adam are recruiting. Interesting that it is Sister Lilith and Brother Adam, and not the other way around, given Adam's ego."

"Good catch. I wonder if Lilith is running the 'cult'? Could she be running everything?"

"She was very quiet, but very brilliant. Lili did not flaunt her mental abilities the way Adam did, but from what I recall, she might just be superior to him."

"What could she be up to? What could be so important that she would commit multiple murders to advance her agenda?"

"I think we'll know only when she tells us. Mason, finding these two is not your responsibility. This is a fascinating find, but turn it over to the hunter-seekers charged with putting this pair in cages."

"Old habits."

"Die hard. Don't mention your source. Catherine did well, and I know you're proud, but you cannot be sure just where this find will wander."

"True. I'll strip away all indications of the source before forwarding this information. "

"She wants approval from you, anyway, not a law-enforcement agency. And one more thing: Grey and Julie are due in late tomorrow afternoon."

I sighed. The visit had slipped my mind. "Familial pleasantries seem obscene at the moment."

I loved Grey, but making nice with Grey and wife Julie was not a comfortable prospect. My soul was in a dark passage; serious talk with Rebecca or Catherine seemed more in order.

"They won't be here long. Julie is gestating; you cannot ignore that."

"I wish Megan had not dumped Grey. I liked Megan." Neither of us much cared for Julie.

"So did I. Grey was too conventional for Megan."

Megan was a brilliant girl. She majored in electrical engineering only to have a career that would pay her well enough to allow her to pursue classical painting. Grey did not understand why anyone would want to paint realistically in an age of perfect imaging by all manner of technologies. When he dropped a comment about Megan "getting over the silly art thing", Megan got over Grey.

I wonder if the engagement ring Julie has was recycled from Megan?

"Megan would have made me a better grandson than Julie ever will."

That was true, but Rebecca was one of the few people on earth I could freely say such a thing. Cultural fashion was set against the possibility that heredity played any part in determining intelligence, despite data accumulating to the contrary. Fashion is never a substitute for critical thinking skills.

"Mason, I've endured all I can of this day. I'm going to shower, sedate myself, and read until I fall asleep."

"Wise. I'll compose my missive to assorted law enforcement agencies, and then do the same. It is time for this day to end."

Mason

I had to tell Catherine. I dreaded this. I was uncertain what she would say.

I would have preferred telling her personally, but I did not have that option. We had to rely upon computers.

Before I said anything, Catherine knew this was no casual chat. I never called her so early in my workday without a good reason.

"You're alone, Catherine? None of this can go any farther."

"It's just me."

"I've done something…dreadful. I need to tell you. I cannot lie to you, but I fear you will hate me."

"Something to do with your job?"

"Everything to do with my job."

"I'm listening."

"Emma became pregnant."

"I knew about that."

"I had the fetus tested by the best people at St Kats. The child would have had the talents of both parents and healthy enough to reach adulthood. I tried to convince Emma to end the pregnancy, but she would not do that. I forced her to have an abortion, and a tubal ligation."

Catherine didn't say anything. She didn't need to; everything was there in her eyes, the shock, the pain, the disappointment.

"You couldn't change her mind?"

"I believe you did…but this is horrible."

"Yes."

"I don't know if I could have done that."

"Catherine, this is the most difficult and painful thing I have ever done."

"But could you do anything else?"

I shook my head. "No. You understand the implication of the genetics."

"Power like Emma's, passed down to dozens, hundreds of people…that could not be. You had to do it, Mason. I don't know how you did it, but you had no other real option."

"Catherine, please don't hate me for this."

"I am shocked, but I see…the longer view, the way you do. I wish you hadn't had to do this, but I can't hate you for it."

"Thank you, Catherine."

"You've always told me the truth, even when it wasn't flattering to you."

"I was afraid of losing you over this."

"That won't happen. How is Rebecca coping?"

"She's resilient, she's tough, but she and Emma were friends. Rebecca is having a hard time. She went and talked to Emma afterward."

"That took guts. I'm sorry you had to do this."

"So am I."

I had kept Catherine. She was…one of them. I dreaded she might consider Emma's forced abortion as an assault on her own kind. I wasn't at all sure she would understand, but she had. Yes, she would be formidable.

It wasn't quite 10 AM, and I was exhausted. I drafted a proposal for a settlement for Emma deLauro. Clearly, she could not stay on at Genomex. I dreaded talking to her again, but I was not going to allow my personal pain stop me from doing my duty. I would not saddle a lower level employee with the task of explaining the terms of the settlement to Emma.

What are you going to say to Jesse?

I realized I had no idea what I could say to him except a bland recitation of the genetic facts.

Rebecca may be correct. The time may have come for me to retire.

Lilith

"Lili, I feel absurd wearing this."

I looked up from the pamphlets I was packing into a leather tote bag. Adam looked miserably uncomfortable and uneasy.

"Adam, don't whine. We need just a small amount of theatre in the way we present ourselves. What kind of impact would we make if we showed up in jeans and t-shirts? The new recruits will love it. You will see."

Adam did look silly in a long, flowing black robe trimmed in purple, with arcane-looking alchemical symbols embroidered in gold, especially when he kept tripping on it. I could hear Kurt and Matthew laughing softly behind us; they were not tripping on their robes. I could almost understand the comments they were making about Adam, but they were careful to speak softly.

Adam nearly went down once more as we began to ascend a slight grade.

"Adam, lift up the hem until we're back on level ground." I controlled my impulse to laugh.

"I'm not used to wearing a dress," he muttered.

"It's not a dress, it's the robe of a high priest of the Higher Humanity. If you persist in thinking of it as a dress instead of the sacred robe of a high priest, you will spoil the effect of an otherwise classy robe of high office." The robes were not cheap and they were not cheap looking. I had borrowed from many sources to design them, using alchemical symbols, Hebrew letters, and some of the simpler Egyptian hieroglyphs.

"On Halloween, maybe this would work."

"Adam, I don't have the patience for this. We have things to do. You're defeating our purpose before we get started." Adam could be so annoying.

"The next time we meet gulls for the Higher Humanity, could we do it at some time other than the middle of the night?"

"Atmosphere is very important. Setting the meeting at 3 AM screens out casual gawkers, and makes the hardy folk who turn up feel special and select."

Adam mumbled a comment about sleeping in the following morning.

"You cannot do that, Adam, we have about 175 embryos to check for healthy development. That is more than I can manage by myself."

"Your wretched embryos can rot."

"No, Adam. They cannot rot. They will not rot."

In the gloom of the unused utility tunnel, I could discern eight figures standing by an electric lantern.

"Eight?" Adam whispered. "We went through all of this so we could talk to eight kids in the middle of the night?"

"Keep your voice down. If two of them become true believers, our outing was a success. Acorns, Adam. We're planting acorns." Paul had always been fond of talking about acorns growing into oaks, and I knew Adam probably became as tired of hearing it as I did.

He mumbled something unintelligible.

"Welcome, brothers and sister." The kids looked well taken care of…soft upper middle class types and absolute lost souls, ripe for the guidance of some guru, some sage, someone who knew more than they did who could tell them something meaningful. Their present lives provided every comfort, but they were not content. When they were this vulnerable, they were so easily gulled. And if I read the signs correctly, three were Genomex mutants.

That night, we added three more foot soldiers to the Higher Humanity.

Mason

I had known Dr Laura Varady nearly all of my adult life. She was at Genomex the day I started. Laura was one of the best people I ever knew, and my oldest friend.

For a long time, Laura was my only friend. She believed in my humanity when everyone else was convinced I had become inhuman. (Well, Rebecca had her suspicions, but I did not know about them.)

Most everyone who knew Laura loved her, and with good reason. I loved her. She must have known why: she filled some of the painful hollow places carved out by my mother's suicide.

After knowing her just a few months short of thirty years, I could not imagine that someday Laura Varady would no longer be my friend, not until I forced the abortion of Emma's child. I knew whatever price I paid with Laura would be heavy. She and Emma had worked together for years and were close.

Shortly after 9 AM, Personnel sent me a brief email indicating Dr Laura Varady had resigned, effective immediately. I had not anticipated her exact response, but I was not surprised she had given notice suddenly.

I left my office. How Laura hated my office. She claimed spending time in there would affect my character. She may have been correct. On the day she first saw it, she said all that cold steel and glass would make me more and more like the persona I wore, and less and less human. For about eighteen months, she gave me a series of low-light plants, remembering that once upon a time, I had been an avid gardener who could grow anything. Unfortunately, all of the plants Laura gave me died, even when she remembered to water them. Finally, she gave up, and said my office was deadly to plants.

I started walking to her office at a brisk pace. I could do that in the Genomex corridors because they were maintained at such a cool temperature. Employees complained, but it made my functioning so much easier.

This morning was different. I made it as far as the maudlin Eleanor Singer fountain, and was so exhausted I sat down and rested, watching the koi glide above the smooth pebbles. Sudden fatigue was not a good sign and not one I could ignore. I would need to see Dr Prodana. I willed myself to stand and walk on, slowly this time, until finally reaching Laura's office.

Except for those few lost months when I had been podded and Laura committed to a mental institution under a false name and false papers by direction of Gabriel Ashlocke, Laura had occupied this office since 1978. Her arrival pre-dated that of Adam by several months.

Laura Varady knew where a lot of metaphoric bodies were buried.

Laura's door was open, as it always was except when she was having a private conversation with someone. Everyone knew that and respected the convention, never knocking.

She was emptying the contents of a desk drawer into a box.

"Mason, if you've come to make sure I'm not leaving with Genomex property, check the cartons yourself." Coming from her, that stung. She still had not looked up from her packing. She knew who I was by patterns of dark and light seen on the periphery of her vision.

"That is not why I am here."

I had never seen her office looking like this. Her African violets were gone from the windows, the grandchildren's 'artwork' stripped from the walls. She always kept brightly colored afghans she made herself in the office in case she or one of her visitors were chilled by the air conditioning. The gallery of photographs of family and friends was gone.

"I could have retired years ago. I probably should have. After Lou died, I kept working because I didn't want to be alone in the house. It seemed so empty without him. Working wasn't a bad idea, but staying on at Genomex was. I should have found another job. I know too much about this place for any one person to know. Don't worry, though; I'm not going to write a book about it and do the damage Paul Breedlove almost did in 2007. Although I may turn to the writing of horror stories involving the perversion of science."

"We all should have left years ago, as soon as we knew Genomex was not as claimed." There was no doubt in my mind that I should have left in 1987, and endured whatever financial hardships followed the loss of the generous Genomex paycheck. Jackie would have made my life miserable, complaining about the disruption of our family and the very likely decrease in income. Matching my enomex pay would have been difficult in those early years. I would have heard more than any sane man would want to hear about how unfortunate it was that we did not live in a house as nice as the one her sister Barbara had Just possibly, we might have divorced earlier, and I might have lost my family sooner than I did. But I would not have spent the last 22 years living as I had, kept alive by heroic medicine, owing Paul Breedlove my life, fighting a crazy shadow war to prevent humanity's demise.

Laura finally looked up from her packing.

"Oh, I don't know, Mason. I believe circumstances have worked out for you much the same even if Adam had not tried to fry you, with peculiar results."

"What do you mean?"

"I believe being the local tyrant suits you very well indeed, and that it is a role you would have created no matter where you were. I think it is who you are, who you want to be. You're not a hero, Mason. You're just a cruel man."

She spoke calmly, surely, not in a white-hot rage, but with certainty and the deep chill of a glacier.

"Many difficult tasks needed doing."

"Keep telling yourself that, Mason. Who knows where that could still take you? And think of the satisfaction you can derive along the way, making people squirm inside with a glance or a tilt of the head."

I had not enjoyed much of what I did. "Whatever satisfaction this job brings is that of performing a nearly impossible, unbearable duty with steadfast purpose and dedication."

Laura was trying to provoke me. She was succeeding.

"You know what I believe now? I think I've been wrong about you. Far from being repulsed or disgusted, I think you've relished every loathsome act."

"That is not true."

"As imperfect as Adam is, I think he was right about you having no conscience." Bringing up Adam's absurd rant about my being a sociopath was the most irritating thing she could have said.

"We've been friends a long time, Laura."

"Only a monster could do what you did to Emma. She trusted you like family. Not that that would mean anything to you."

"It means everything to me. I take neither friends nor family for granted."

"You're thinning the ranks of both and you didn't have much to begin with."

"Laura, you understand genetics. I had careful tests done on that baby to be sure before I acted. There was no ambiguity, no doubt about what she would be. Do you want to read the report? I'll release a copy to you."

"I'm sure the report was solid. But you were dealing with Emma. Emma and Jesse. Only a monster could have done what you did to them. I was wrong about you all this time. All those years when I tried to keep the human in you alive, I wasted the effort, because there never was a human inside past adolescence."

"I think Rebecca would disagree."

"Rebecca! Lost-soul, delusional Rebecca. How pitiful that an otherwise intelligent woman convinced herself to share your life of lies! You'll hurt her when it serves you, too, and likely enjoy doing it. You're a sick, sick man. Goodbye, Mason."

I was in no mood to listen to anymore, and Laura made clear she was not about to change her mind. I turned away from her, and stalked out of her office.

But my day had just started. Early afternoon brought on my scheduled interview with Rob Abelmann.

Rebecca had not described my old neighbor Rob, but from her detailing of his years since leaving Genomex, I expected to find him worn and frayed. So I was astonished when he strolled into my office looking not much changed at all, except in the eyes.

"Good afternoon, Mason."

He shook my gloved hand, hesitating as most people do.

He was doing his best to be cheerful, but my office was designed to produce anything but cheer. I wanted people off balance and uncomfortable, allowing me control of almost any situation.

"Dr Steyn told you this is not the Genomex of the past."

Instinctively, I did not call her Rebecca, not wanting Rob to speak of her in familiar terms. He was surprised to hear me speak of her formally, but he knew better than to comment. Let him believe what he wished.

"I'm was shocked when she described the changes, but the shock was a pleasant one."

"Our work here is no less serious. If anything, it is more urgent, and focused."

That was truth. That was part of why I stayed on, no matter what was required of me.

"You're actually working to extend the lives of the Genomex mutants."

"Without serious medical intervention, most of them will have attenuated life spans. We cannot cure them. We can only lessen their miseries, and discourage them from making more doomed souls like themselves. We are the clean-up crew."

"I'm not sure it is possible to clean up this mess."

"Neither am I. But I must try. As few people do, you know exactly what is at stake."

Yes, Rob knew. Neither of us wanted to talk about what the Genomex mutants implied. I wasn't going to lie to Rob or pretend the program had an endpoint. Short of undreamed-of medical advances curing Genomex mutants and making them ordinary humans, I could not imagine an end to the program.

After a pause, I continued. "Since late 2007, I have worked to bring the Genomex mutants out of the shadows. In exchange for a promise…to have no children. We have placed the majority of known mutants in real-world jobs, allowing them complete lives lived as normally as possible. They do not wear governors and I do not monitor them or interfere in their lives. St Katherine's is available to them when their mutancy creates medical problems, as it inevitably does for all of them."

"That's drastic."

"It is pragmatic. Living in the so-called 'underground' was to live in a state of fear, frequently to live in squalor, and to have no future in particular. Some of them were already quite ill and had nowhere to turn for effective treatment. The lives they've gained are fuller, with far greater personal possibilities. Few of them regret leaving their past lives. Only a handful have gone back into the 'underground', individuals who could not adjust to the demands of ordinary life, or found making an honest living too much trouble. The GSA actively pursues and captures only individuals who are a threat to everyone. I now pod only the untreatable ones who are uncontrolled and dangerousThe criminals I channel into the courts after surgically implanting a governor not noticeable to the casual observer and constantly active."

"You have Angela working for you, Rebecca said."

Rebecca. I did not care for the way Rob spoke her name.

"Dr Angela Fontenelle has been on the staff of St Katherine's for awhile now. We're fortunate to have her. She brings high skill and unique understanding to her position. She is not unique. There are several MDs and nurses on staff who are themselves mutants. I have a scholarship fund for highly qualified mutants, to train and educate more in any medical specialty applicable to the treatment of Genomex mutants, so that I may have more on staff in the future. The ordinary human staff are the best I could recruit, but we have found the insights of the mutants to be valuable."

"You've set up an ambitious project here, Mason."

"Yes. It needed to be done. No one else was doing it."

"I'd like to talk to Angela."

"St Katherine's is open to the public. You can walk in the front door much as anyone. However, I do not know her work schedule."

"You have no objections to my meeting her?"

Why would he think that?

"Certainly not. Dr Fontenelle can remove any lingering doubts about Genomex and St Katherine's."

Or me.

"Is there a chance of my being hired here, Mason? I'm almost afraid to hope."

Until Rob said that, I had not realized how desperately he wanted to return to Genomex. Rebecca told me about the dreadful jobs he'd been forced to take. He hadn't exaggerated.

"That depends upon whether Drs Lukather, Wasson and Watanabe want your skills, and whether you have committed any unforgivable sin since leaving Genomex. We are careful about whom we hire."

He was curious about that, but not bold enough to ask, not with something of importance at stake.

"Rebecca and Laura Varady are the only other people left from the old days."

"There is a good reason for that. I have had problems in the past with employees who served two masters. You are not quietly in the pay of Adam Kane, are you?"

I had to ask, and I had to watch his reaction to what should have been a stunning question.

"Hardly. We were not friends. You know what Adam is like."

"All too well. Over time, his endearing qualities have become exaggerated, and even more annoying."

"But he's in prison."

"Not any longer. Like a character from an ancient horror movie, he walks among us again. He is likely to return here, as he has several times in the past. As in the past, his visit could be violent. If you become an employee here, are you prepared to deal with a violent Adam?"

"Meaning?"

"In 2007, Adam and a thug of his invaded this facility and injured Dr Steyn badly enough to send her to an emergency room. In 2008 he invaded with what may be best described as mercenaries, killing several employees. Adam is very dangerous. After a year on the job, employees are offered, but not forced, to take GSA range training and are authorized to carry onsite. Security cannot be everywhere. I will not have my people slaughtered with no means of personal defense."

"Isn't that extreme?"

How easy to stand back from a safe distance and proclaim my measures extreme.

"Not when you have to look at the blood and the bodies. Dr Steyn has all the authorization of a GS agent, even though she draws only one paycheck."

"Rebecca?"

We've all changed, Rob. Rebecca is prepared to use those skills. I do not doubt it.

I nodded my head.

"She hated guns."

I allowed myself a small smile. "She's as good a shot as I am now."

"Wow."

"I just want you to know that while Genomex is no longer in the Chamber of Horrors line of business, there remain risks."

"Thank you. I never would have guessed most of this."

"We need good people, Rob. After all, we're trying to save humanity. Nevertheless, there are people –individuals—working against us. As long as you understand what you would become part of…"

"You've been open and honest about it."

More than you ever expected me to be.

"My assistant will escort you to the lobby. Whatever Drs Lukather, Wasson, and Watanabe decide, I wish you well."

And I meant it. But I did not like the way he spoke of Rebecca, though such familiar usage was typical at Genomex. His presence took me back to the miserable years in the 1990s, when Adam and Rob were competing professionally, and for Rebecca's attentions as well, although she wasn't much aware of that. But I had not known that then, watching unhappily from an impossible distance.

So, knowing the whole of the truths, all of the truths one could know of a thing, why do I feel threatened now?

I had no good answer for myself. I returned to business and found an email from Rebecca reminding me of the arrival of Grey and Julie in the afternoon.

Rebecca

The day after Emma's forced abortion I buried myself in my lab work, not wanting to reflect any longer upon the darkness of the previous day, or waste thought dreading the relatively trivial annoyances promised by the coming afternoon. As much as I would have liked to have some samples arrive requiring my personal attention, oh, well into the evening, long enough to avoid Julie's company, I would not mind missing dinner at all.

Julie was not my favorite. She reminded me a little too much of someone else, someone from Vermont: never a hair out of place and she smiled too much. I've never found people who smile much too much to be worthy of trust. I suspected she was more intelligent that she presented herself to be. She reminded me of dozens of female characters in 1950s movies, charming, flattering, and scheming. How could Grey stand it?

Picnic tables on site overlooked the lake. Employees ate lunch there when weather allowed. We brought a picnic supper down to the tables.

I could always talk to Grey, but I was never sure what to say to Julie, especially now. She was several months along in her pregnancy, farther than either of mine had lasted.

I found myself envying her youth and the ease with which she conceived. Don't do that, Rebecca. Julie's half your age, a shallow, miserable waste of oxygen, whom you need not envy.

"Why didn't you have children during your first marriage, Rebecca?"

Had she read my mind? Jolted out of my reflections, I looked across the table at smiling Julie. She had delivered the question sweetly, but sweetness was not her intent. The cruelty of her question was startling. Ask a rude question, Julie, and you never know what you'll get for an answer. Why didn't you learn any manners?

"In part because Jeff did not have the testosterone to get the job done, but chiefly because any progeny of his would not have been worth risking my life in a pregnancy."

My, don't I sound arrogant? But it's true. Several friends of mine who wanted children badly made poor, desperate choices in husbands. Their longed-for children were disappointments, lacking the mental agility of their mothers. I could not imagine having children who would always lag behind me.

"Well, you have your work. That's very important to you. It's good you weren't born any earlier than you were. Women didn't do much not so long ago, did they?"

Catty wench. Grey, can this trophy mean much to you?.

Mason didn't care for what Julie was saying, either. "I've always found work to be the best means of coping with personal difficulties. Goals are met, and work is not personally destructive in the manner of alcohol and drugs."

"Many women were content with being traditional. Grandmother Steyn was a pediatrician. My other grandmother was a concert pianist. My great-great-aunt Deborah was a field hospital surgeon in the Kaiser's army. Later she wrote one of the more famous German novels to come out of World War I."

All of that was true, but my annoyance had driven me to pile it on a little thickly. Julie probably did not know what a Kaiser was, or what the war was about. Pearls before swine.

Julie had never told Grey about her half-brother Jules who had spent the last ten years in and out of treatment centers for his addiction. Jules had lost his family and career, and seemed unlikely to live to be forty. Grey still didn't know about Jules, but Mason and I did. Mason could ferret out anything about anybody. Jules was not the only interesting family detail Julie failed to share with Grey.

Mason took care not to let on how thoroughly he investigated anyone his children became involved with. Julie's family was not as upstanding as she described them. Eight years ago, her father had been investigated but never indicted for questionable business deals. Her mother managed several school cafeterias until presented with evidence she was diverting school food into her sideline catering business, after which she resigned, and agreed to pay for what she had swiped. He had yet to find anything damning, but given time, this would happen.

Grey knew none of this, and Mason wasn't going to tell him unless Grey had to know. Julie had already driven a slight wedge between them that Mason had no wish to widen.

Mason delivered his comment to Julie with an ambiguous smile calculated to make her wonder just what he knew so she would squirm inwardly. I was amused.

"And I was glad to have that work. Getting rid of Jeff was expensive."

But not, I think, as expensive as Grey would find divorcing Julie!

The balance of the meal and after was mercifully civil. We cleaned up the table, and went for a walk beside the water at twilight.

Mason held my hand. We probably looked ancient to Julie. I wondered what she thought of Mason and me showing affection, something people who were part of Genomex saw only by the rarest chance. She found Mason very odd, but most people did find him peculiar. He was peculiar. I did not mind her finding Mason odd; she apparently found me very odd as well. I did mind her less than subtle comments that flew right past Grey but not by me and not by Mason. Her cruel streak was unlikely to soften; we both had misgivings about well motherhood suited her. Julie was subtle about this, which is part of why I believed she was smarter than casual observation indicated. Over time, her comments to and about Mason indicated her genuine attitude.

Julie was visibly bored with the conversation. Mason and Grey were both fascinated by the American Civil War. They both referred to it as the War of Northern Aggression. I knew a fair amount about its influence on the waging of later wars, especially WW1, but I had not delved into any of the personalities involved except Lee.

I caught Julie making faces she thought no one else noticed while Grey and Mason ran various blockades, and re-fought various campaigns. When one of them found a well-done book about the War of Northern Aggression, they sent it to the other to read. Julie probably resented this. She never said anything about the contents of any book. She was not inclined towards the intellectual. How could Grey stand her company?

Very suddenly, the mild soft twilight descended into nightmare.

Jesse glided up to us, unnoticed in the soft light of the fading day.

Until I saw Jesse do it, I would have thought that what he did was impossible.

Mason and I both should have been paying greater attention to our surroundings, but even if we had, I'm not certain either of us could have changed anything. Neither of us had the physical strength to stop Jesse. He was not presenting an obvious threat, so we did not think of using weapons or calling security. At that moment, he was still Mason's most trusted lieutenant and likely heir.

We were all absorbed in one another or in the lovely sunset. No one noticed Jesse until he was nearly upon us.

"Mason, I was told you would be here with Grey and your daughter-in-law."

The vague threat implied in his voice was disturbing, coming from someone we had trusted. Even in the fading light, Jesse's eyes betrayed him. He did not appear wholly there.

"Jesse?" Mason saw it, too.

Jesse made no reply. He walked purposefully up to Grey and Julie, making his right arm intangible, then passing it into Julie's belly.

Julie screamed. The rest of us stared. Our minds can perceive and process only what we are prepared to see, and what Jesse was doing was so far outside our experience that we had difficulty understanding what we saw. When we first see what we believe impossible, we hardly see it at all.

To do the next part, he must have made his hand and wrist selectively tangible inside of Julie, then intangible as he withdrew his hand with Julie's fetus outside of her with the umbilical cord severed and sealed at the end. Jesse threw the fetus with all possible force down onto the beach below.

I screamed. I can cope with almost anything, but this was so far outside of what I believed possible I lost control. The act alone was horrible, and the fact that Jesse was responsible deepened the horror.

"Now we're even, Mason." Jesse's smirk made me queasy. He stood there a moment, enjoying the look on Mason's face. He turned slowly, in no great hurry, and walked deliberately back towards the facility at a casual pace. Jesse knew we could do nothing to him.

Julie went limp and collapsed to the ground.

"Have you killed her, too?" Mason shouted at Jesse.

Jesse stopped, turned halfway around, and said, "No. She's just…surprised." He was still smiling. Then he continued walking.

Grey started after Jesse, but Mason grabbed his arm, and stopped him. "No…you can't do anything to him, but he can destroy you. He could pinch your head off as easily as you can twist a grape from a stem."

I didn't know what I could do for Julie, but I gathered my wits, and called for emergency help. Then I knelt by Julie, searched for and found a pulse.

Grey cornered his father. "Do you know why he did this?"

"I do." Mason released Grey, and stalked back towards Julie, Grey at his heels.

"Then tell me," Grey demanded. "It's about your damn mutants, isn't it?"

"Julie is our immediate concern, Grey." Mason kneeled on the other side of her. "Is she alive?"

"I think she's breathing. I'm trying to find a pulse." I didn't have much practice at this kind of thing.

"I want to know now. Tell me," Grey demanded.

"Which I will, after dealing with your wife." Mason remained focused. Grey was aggravating him, but he would not address that annoyance until the immediate crisis was controlled.

Julie did not look good. Mason glanced my way. I handed him my cell phone. "You'll need to key in the passcode to open the gate for the ambulance."

"I want to know now," Grey insisted.

Mason ignored Grey, and attended to opening the gate. He was losing patience with his son rapidly.

"She has a pulse. I don't know enough to interpret it."

Mason handed me my cell phone, and turned to Grey. "I stopped their child from being born."

"That's insane."

"Really? That child would have been capable of the abomination we just witnessed, and all the abilities of her mother, who can induce emotion and attack the minds of others. I've dedicated by adult life to stop havoc like this from affecting the wider society. That is my job," Mason replied calmly and deliberately.

"That's not the way you described it all these years."

"There are a lot of things I could not and cannot tell you. That's also the nature of my job."

I turned to Grey. "Stop it, Grey. You don't know enough about these things to make judgments."

"And you do?" he challenged.

"Yes," I answered, annoyed with the way Grey was arguing with his father instead of tending to his stricken wife. I would have said more, but I allowed Grey the benefit of the doubt. People can react oddly to crises. Grey's anxiety for Julie could be emerging as an argument with Mason.

Shouldn't you be one of the people down on the ground trying to help her?

Then something unexpected happened. Julie opened her eyes and sat up without hesitation.

"How do you feel?" I asked. I felt foolish saying that but I could not think of anything else.

"Dazed. Did I faint?" After surprise flickered through her eyes I saw something else: disgust at the proximity of Mason.

"Something like that," Mason told her. "Don't move. There's an ambulance on the way."

She surprised me next by scrambling to her feet, without hesitation or special effort. As soon as she did that, she sensed an unmistakable wrongness in her balance. I watched panic cross her face as she realized she was no longer pregnant.

"What happened?" She was screaming.

Mason and I could not move as fast as Julie, but we rose after her, standing to either side of her, ready to support her if she became unsteady or weak.

"You don't remember?" Mason asked.

"No."

You don't want to remember. "The paramedics will be here anytime." I tried to sound a good deal calmer than I was.

"Grey?" She looked pleadingly at Grey, as if Grey could help her.

Grey help you? Your Grey has been worthless.

Mason flashed a glare at Grey. I had never seen him do that with one of his children, but he was clearly irritated by his son's conduct.

He's lucky she didn't witness what he did, or more accurately, did not do. I would not tolerate such lame, lukewarm behavior.

Grey finally took over from Mason and me.

"Grey, I want to get away from here. Right now."

"We have to get you to a hospital. The ambulance is on the way."

I walked up beside Mason. "What are you going to do with Jesse?"

"Beyond demanding his resignation, there isn't anything I can do. I dare not go to law enforcement. Who would believe what we just saw? So many questions would be raised that I'd rather not have asked outside of Genomex. Did you hear me, Grey?"

"I heard it, but I can't believe you're saying it. People need to know about these monsters. They need to be hunted down and dealt with."

"Don't pursue this."

"I'll pursue what I want to pursue."

"If you do that, people will panic. Think about the consequences of this becoming general knowledge."

Grey looked at me. "And what do you say?"

"Understand what is at stake. There is so much more involved than personal justice for you."

I don't think Grey understood what I said.

There was nothing more Mason could say. He couldn't control Grey. Or could he? What could Mason do? If he believed Grey was a threat to the program…Mason was capable of all kinds of things, things Grey knew nothing about and couldn't imagine. Would he pod Grey?

The ambulance rolled up the access drive. The light was failing fast; Mason waved to be certain of having their attention.

"Grey, I don't really believe I need a hospital. I just fainted because of the heat."

Grey looked stunned. "No, more happened than that. You need to go."

"I don't want to make a fuss about this. I just need to rest a little while."

"Julie…" Grey began.

"Julie, of everyone present, I have the most experience in matters of childbirth and its complications. Go to the hospital. Grey will go with you."

Julie wasn't going to argue with her father-in-law. She didn't like him and she was more than a little afraid of Mason.

The paramedics left with Julie and Grey, leaving me with Mason. Night was coming on fast.

"I'm glad you thought of that. I have no idea what will happen to her next. Her body had to have a response to her suddenly vanished fetus."

"Grey could not cope with a suddenly hemorrhaging woman. We have unfinished business. I'd rather not do the next part alone," Mason said softly.

"Your grandson."

"Yes."

And I knew why. "His DNA would indicate close kinship to you. There would be no good answers to the questions created by the DNA results."

He nodded. "The ground is hard. Digging will be difficult."

Rain had not fallen in weeks. The ground would be almost impossible to dig without a pick or a drill. "I have an idea, Mason. There are ovens in my lab hot enough to reduce anything organic to inorganic residue. Nothing would be left for anyone to test." I shocked myself thinking of anything so desperate.

"How long would that take?"

"Just a few hours." Just a few hours to reduce anything so small…to inorganic ash.

Mason did not hesitate, but hurried down to the beach, searching for the remains of his grandson by the faint exterior lights, and the faint glow in the western sky. I sat down on a bench, allowing myself a moment's rest.

Once again, you've drawn me into sharing a terrible secret. There must be an end to these terrible secrets. I want this to end. I want to carry out the duty I have promised, and then, I want to run away as far as I can as fast as I can, and never look back. But that would mean abandoning the people I care for.

The person I care for most is destroying me. I cannot handle any more lives ended before they have a chance to begin.

I knew life with Mason would not be like anything else.

I would never have agreed to anything as crazy as the last few days. I believe I might have made a terrible mistake. But it's not too late to change things. No. There are other jobs in other places. No more freakish mutants. No more peculiar people. No more feeling somewhat responsible for the fate of humanity. I've been strong for a very long time…but even I have limits.

Leave tonight, or you will never do it.

The nightmare deepens. I am afraid we have not yet found the bottom, Mason.

Darkness had fallen when Mason emerged from the shadows. He had removed his jacket and carried it wrapped in a bundle. I knew what he had inside.

"A few minutes more and an animal would have gotten to him. Predators and scavengers live around the site."

Mason did not need to tell me about all the wildlife that lived at Genomex. I had lived here long enough to be familiar with the site wildlife at night, more abundant and active than anyone working daylight hours only would imagine.

This isn't just about hiding evidence, is it? This is about doing something proper…under duress.

We could have double or triple bagged everything in burn bags, and disposed of those like other autoclavable waste. We could have put him into a bag, and been done quickly. The bags would never be searched. At best, their contents were assumed to be foul, smelly microbial samples; at worst they might be microbial samples best avoided if one wished to remain healthy and whole.

Bagging the remains like waste would have been indecent.

We said nothing walking back to the building and to my lab. Everyone had long gone home by this hour, and security would think nothing of me going to my lab at this hour, with Mason accompanying me.

They might wonder what Mason was carrying, but none of the corridors we traveled were equipped with cameras allowing close inspection.

The muffle ovens sat in a fume hood. I started putting on latex gloves.

"I want to do that, Rebecca."

"Very well."

He placed his sad little bundle on the edge of the hood.

I opened an oven door. Relieved that Mason was doing this, and not me, I turned away. I wanted no visual memory.

"Just set everything down on the floor of the oven?"

"Yes. And your gloves, too. We don't want any of this found. A small amount of tissue would cause too many questions. Then nearly close the oven door. At first, there will be a lot of smoke. We want to vent that and the water."

"Then what?"

I turned around, lowered the glass front almost fully down, and plugged in the oven.

"To be perfectly thorough, we'd want to clean up whatever blood is out there on the beach, but we'd draw a crowd doing that. Mason, is there a camera aimed at the picnic area all the time?"

If there was a digital record of what Jesse had done…

"I'm not sure. There may be. I will need to destroy the record if one exists. If anyone was watching in real time, every agent on site would have rushed here. The records are not reviewed unless questions are asked. I did not summon agents, so they will assume only that Julie became ill. Any blood found by a hiking employee will be assumed to be that of an animal. Security knows animals hunt and get into fights deep in the night out there. "

We hadn't looked at each other while doing these things. The evening had aged him. No doubt it had aged me as well.

"This is all so pitifully sad."

"I want the ashes. I don't care that they'll include jacket and gloves as well."

"I'll save them for you." I found paper on my desk and left a note on the hood window, indicating that the 'sample' was mine, and that it was to be left undisturbed.

"We can't do anything more here. Let's go back to our cave, Mason."

I said nothing more; there wasn't much more that could be said. We waited until the smoking stopped, then I closed the oven door. I turned to Mason. He did not look good. I took up his ungloved left hand, and began leading him from the lab.

The lights in the corridors of Genomex were never dimmed. Walking about at night after hours, things appeared much as they did during a working day. The silence was deep at this hour, however, with the complete absence of human voices.

We were very safe. I had no doubt that we were watched by GSA monitoring the facility, since we were very likely the only other people on the grounds. Agents not actively viewing screens were probably being called to them to take in the spectacle of their boss holding hands with me. All GSA were told we were married, but Mason's grim, demanding persona and the distance we kept during working hours caused much speculation about the nature of our relationship. I knew we were inspiring a whole new chapter of Mason-lore; the GSA were a gossipy bunch. I didn't care.

"I blame myself," Mason said.

"Why? You don't read minds."

"No mind-reading was required. Killing Jessica Anne predictably destroyed Jesse."

And the connection you had with one another. Jesse needed a father and you needed a son. You've both sustained terrible losses.

"What could you have done?"

"Had him watched."

"No one could have anticipated what he did to Julie."

"Nothing in Jesse's past implied that he would have been capable of anything like this."

"I should have had security watching for Jesse."

"Even if you had done that, what difference would it have made? Jesse walks through walls. What happened was no fault of yours. Jesse did this. Jesse and Jesse alone is responsible."

I turned to him. He looked terrible. "Mason, I am so sorry."

"Thank you." But he did not sound much consoled.

"Shouldn't you be checking in with Grey?"

"Yes. Soon. Grey is handling this poorly. He's reacting with raw emotions and not thinking through what he is doing. He's acting the way his mother would have done, making himself the focus of the crisis."

That was the worst condemnation of Grey that Mason could have given.

"You also need to start the search for Jesse."

"I'll start a search, but he'll never be caught. Even if he's found, how could anyone hold him? I could chase sightings for years."

"I don't think I've ever heard you so resigned to failure before."

"Jesse's abilities and familiarity with my methods make a special case of him. Right now, I want to go to ground in my steel cave and hide. I don't want to think about what is going on in that oven. I'll call Grey and Security once we're both behind steel walls."

I showered while Mason made phone calls. I emerged from the shower to find Mason staring out into the night, not focusing on anything. He had dimmed the interior lights so that the only illumination came from LEDs casting a faint, muted glow.

"Did you talk to Grey?" I asked.

"Partway to the hospital, Julie began bleeding. The doctors did not question the story Grey told about a miscarriage. Julie will be fine. Nothing remains that could create a problem later. She's going to be kept overnight and released."

Something about Mason's voice was wrong. I went over to him. I said nothing more; he turned his head slightly towards me. By LED-glow, I saw a single tear glide down his cheek.

I had never seen Mason cry before. His control was always perfect, so perfect that the sight of the single teardrop was more disturbing than the sight of most other people weeping uncontrollably would have been.

He was a proud man, and I knew he thought that tear a weakness, a failing, so I knew better than to speak of it. I pretended to see nothing, and hugged him without comment.

How much more can you handle? I'm feeling way past worn-out myself.

Mason

I spent the morning reviewing what we knew about Jesse's movements before his return to Genomex.. There was not much to know. He was documented paying his hotel bill with his Genomex issued credit card, and I knew which seat he had occupied on an ordinary flight, but there was nothing implying what came later or where he might have gone. Upon his arrival at the site, the system noted his heat signature, but had not flagged it since he was wearing his unique and proper badge. As far as the system knew, everything was fine.

In hindsight, a system vulnerability. But we could not anticipate everything.

With Jesse's ability to walk through walls, and deep knowledge of Genomex security and procedures, the chances of finding Jesse were small.

Truthfully, I was not concerned with finding him. I was concerned with where he would go, and whether he would seek out Adam. I had not expected to keep Jesse's good will; procedures had been worked out offsite independent of Jesse's people, to immediately replace all codes the moment I wished. I had activated that change last night, but I knew that was not a permanent fix.

I would have preferred staying away from my office completely, but if I did not stay busy, I would only feel worse. The morning dragged on interminably. Early afternoon brought Grey.

Even as he entered my office, I could tell from Grey's voice that he was going to be noisily emotional. I hated such displays, especially from men. But in fairness to Grey, I could not refuse to see him.

"Julie is leaving me over what your monster did to her."

Grey's voice nearly broke when he said that. I hoped he would not cry in front of me, the way he did at our old house. At least he wasted no time getting to the source of the problem.

"Jesse is not my monster," I replied calmly, not raising my voice, trying to calm Grey so he would no longer remind me so much of his mother.

"He worked for you, didn't he?"

"For a time. But I did not make him what he is, or instruct that it be done. Adam Kane and Paul Breedlove corrupted his genetics and made him what you saw."

"None of that matters. Your involvement with these freaks caused this." He was thinking purely with his emotions, with no restraint at all. He appeared on the edge of weeping like a child or weak woman. My disappointment with Grey knew no limits at that moment.

"Now you may begin to understand my work. My adult life has been dedicated to the control of renegade mutants, to prevent the horrors they could bring upon larger society."

"Well, you failed to control this horror."

"They're not animals, Grey. Not most of them, anyway. Catherine is not an animal."

"Damn Catherine. She's a freak, too."

"No, Grey. Catherine's never done anything to harm you or your sisters. She did not choose to be what she is." Speaking so of Catherine was infuriating. She had worked at gaining the acceptance of my older children. Up until this moment, I believed she had succeeded.

"How could you stay on here and work with these…creatures?"

"Grey, you should also know that following Adam's attempt to murder me, Genomex settled a large sum of money on me. I could have lived comfortably ever after. But you, the twins, and Catherine would not have received first class educations. I continued working to stop these monsters, yes, but I also did it for you."

"You only care about your damn mutants."

You're a self-focused, emotional fool, Grey.

"Your gratitude warms my heart." Grey had gone on too long.

Miserable ingrate. Clearly, I was wasting any effort made with him.

I glared at him the way I had so often with employees, achieving the desired effect of putting fear of me into Grey's heart. He had more insults to hurl at me, but I had him cowed. I wished it hadn't worked so readily; at that moment I realized Grey would never be my equal. He lacked my courage and will. He had had too easy a time of it, and there was too much of Jackie in him.

How different you would have been had I been there with you. It's too late to change you now. A waste.

"Grey, I am not belittling your loss, but understand: no one's life proceeds as they imagined it. Except for a handful of people insulated from the world, pampered by indulgent souls who confuse such cosseting with love, everyone suffers some measure of tragedy."

"I thought if I worked hard, worked honest, and stayed out of trouble that my life would fall into place."

"Life is never that easy." My son is a fool.

"I'll never be able to replace Julie."

Julie was no great loss. She had never struck me as even being particularly fond of Grey, but she did enjoy spending their earnings. "Have you considered that perhaps Julie did not have the character suited to go through life with anyone?"

"Don't start tearing Julie apart. You never did like her."

No, I never did like her. Julie is too much like Jackie.

"Consider what I've said."

"What did you do to Jesse to make him do what he did? And how the hell did he do it?"

Grey deserved to know the truth. He was emotional, but he was not screaming at me as he had done last night.

"I don't know how many laws and regulations I'm breaking by telling you, but you should know. Jesse can walk through walls as readily as you or I walk through doorways. Emma is probably the most dangerous Genomex mutant alive. She can induce emotions, create illusions, and destroy a mind with a thought. If they were not inherently good people, the two of them could have torn great, chaotic holes in society."

"And you call them good people?"

"Grey, listen to me. They were not supposed to have children, but Emma conceived against the odds. Her daughter carried all the traits of both parents. I had Emma seized, sedated, given an involuntary abortion, and a tubal ligation. More than anything, they wanted that daughter."

Grey stared at me with disgust. "How could you do anything so horrible?"

Perhaps I erred and told him too much detail. Clearly, he loathed me more. Didn't he realize that unpleasant acts were sometimes unavoidable? That pleasant was not always a possibility?

"Because it had to be done. Such talents could not be passed down to later generations."

"Who made you God over the lives of these people?"

"It's not about being God, Grey. It's about recognizing a dangerous taint in the human pedigree, and preventing that taint from spreading, or better yet, eliminating it altogether."

"That's insane."

"Insanity is the belief that if nothing is done all the outcomes will be happy ones. One of these anomalies can black out an entire city at will. A few hundred of them, bent on destruction, could destroy civilization."

Grey was silent for a moment. Like most people, he did not think anything bad could happen to him. Bad things happened to other people, far away. Most likely, he was rejecting what I said as too grim and unpleasant. Catastrophes several generations away were too distant for worry and concern.

"So Jesse killed my baby to avenge the murder of his own?"

"Yes. Short of reading his mind, that is the most reasonable guess."

"Are you proud of what you've done?"

"I'm proud of doing a difficult, distasteful job…very well. There are tasks that must be done…that sicken the heart of any sane man. If no one fought off the barbarians, if no police kept criminals at bay, society would collapse."

I could tell by his eyes that I was getting nowhere with Grey. He was still in that unfortunate mode of thinking that believes all the woes of mankind can be erased with the application of more niceness. With any luck, life would teach him otherwise, and soon.

"How do you know you're not one of the barbarians?" Grey accused.

Fortunately, I have a great deal of personal control, or I would have struck my own son.

"That's enough, Grey."

"Do you think you can tell me to shut up, like a child?"

"You have a lot of learning to do before you're a man."

Talking to Grey was costing more energy than I possessed. I had to get my disappointing son ouit of my sight. I did not care whether I ever spoke to him again. I had failed him, and I did not wish to be reminded of my failure.

"You're the freak, Dad. Your obsession with these people is sick."

"Grey, please leave now, or I will have security carry you out."

He turned and walked towards the door, stopping just short of it, and turned back towards me. "The truth hurts, doesn't it?"

"The truth does, but not the truth you think you know."

Grey left. He had no idea what I meant.

Could I have done anything differently to raise Grey to be more like myself? No. Not without being there, and I could not take Jackie back after her betrayal, and I could not spend much time in the open world, not with compromised immune system. Damn. What surprises do Deidre and Michelle have waiting for me?

I returned to my stainless steel cave, reviewed email and voice messages, and decided this would be a biopolymer-free night. I stripped away my faux skin, and after showering did not replace it. These quarters were so clean I could dare to do this a few nights out of each month without adverse effects. There were times when I could not stand the feeling of otherness, of difference, of being set apart. I needed to feel I was still human.

All of my illusions about Grey are shattered. I've falsely believed he was like me, a hawk. He is a canary.

Rebecca

I'm not sure which one of us was most horrified by Jesse's incredible act. Up until I saw him do it, I honestly believed that most of the Genomex mutants were people much like myself, just ever so slightly blessed or cursed with some peculiar trait or ability. I knew several of them whom I had considered fine people, and among that number I had included Jesse.

Now, I was not so sure. Pushed emotionally, Jesse had reacted visciously against a woman he hardly knew, and against Grey, whom he did know, and who had never brought Jesse a negative moment, all for the sake of revenge against Mason.

I was no stranger to the insane or violent acts of Genomex mutants. Gabriel Ashlocke destroyed my first baby, willfully, intentionally, with emotional cruelty. He did not know me, but he hurt me anyway.

I had thought Ashlocke was an oddity, but perhaps I had been too generous with these people all along. Maybe I should be afraid of them all. I didn't like that possibility, but between what I had seen and what Mason had told me, wasn't such fear realistic?

I loved Catherine. She was the closest I would ever come to having a daughter, and thinking of her as other-than-human was difficult.

But what proof is there that in the right circumstances Catherine would not turn on Mason and on me, using her stealthiness to harm us? None at all.

No. Catherine knows she is loved by us both. She would never harm us.

Are you sure? How can you possibly be sure?

You cannot be certain. Or, as Mason says when this ugly mess is consuming his attention, damn Breedlove, damn Adam.

Maybe Mason had been correct in his initial approach of containing and even podding as many of the Genomex mutants as possible. The approach was heavy handed, expensive, and would have been a public relations disaster if the general public had ever found out. But a podded mutant harmed no one.

Then there was Emma. Mason had always considered her among the most dangerous of mutants. He was also certain she was capable of more than she disclosed, and that only her own decency and ethics kept her from manipulating people constantly.

I was confused and conflicted. And these were only my thoughts as I walked to my lab.

Mason had turned off the muffle oven hours ago. The contents had cooled enough to be handled.

Handled? With what, to be placed into what?

I opened the oven door and took in the sight of the meager residue of ash on the oven floor, three generations reduced to this.

Well, now what do I do?

Analytical labs don't commonly stock funeral urns. I found a small glass jar with a half-dozen low-bleed septa still in it, transferred them to a capped plastic tube. Using paper towels I swept out the floor of the oven onto a sheet of quadrille paper, and used that to funnel the ashes into the jar.

I knew Mason would want this sad little jar, so I slipped it into a labcoat pocket and set off for his office.

He was staring down into Podding Operations when I arrived. No one had been podded for months. A group of technicians were testing a pod, and preparing it for use.

"That's for Jesse, isn't it?"

"Yes. If I can catch him. What else can I do with him, Rebecca?"

"I cannot imagine." I reached into my pocket. "I meant no disrespect using this jar, Mason. It was the cleanest, most secure container I had." I tamed my tears as he took it from my hand.

"That's all there is?"

"Yes. There isn't that much left once you take away the water, and oxidize the organics."

"I can take it to our quarters. I just wanted you to know the ashes were…safe."

"Would you do that, please?"

"Of course."

I did not say it, but knowing Mason's fastidious nature, someone might find the jar and assume they were doing the proper thing in throwing it out.

I took back the jar. "Do you have any idea where Jesse is?"

"None. I suppose I'll have to have Emma monitored and watched. How distasteful. She'll know she's being surveilled."

"Do that electronically. She cannot throw out illusions when she does not know who she is deceiving."

"A good point. Ordinarily, I prefer agents on the ground."

"There is nothing ordinary about Emma."

"True."

We were both startled when the office door opened, admitting Emma.

"I haven't come to hurt you, Mason. Enough hurt has been going around. I'm not adding to it."

I must have looked worried.

"I really mean it, Rebecca. I could blast both of you through that glass and down into the floor below, but I'm not about to do that." She stared down at the pod below. "Is that for Jesse?"

"I'm sorry, Emma. If I capture him, I have to treat him as if he's insane."

Emma sighed. "I don't know if you'll believe me, but if you catch Jesse, I think he should be podded."

"Emma?" I was stunned. Emma looked serious.

"After Jesse murdered your grandson, he came to me and told me what he had done. He thought I would approve, or even be happy about it. I was horrified."

"I have an active search for him."

"I assumed you would. I told Jesse that we were finished, that no matter how hideous one considers your crime against me, destroying an innocent changed nothing, and hurt people who were uninvolved and not responsible."

"Emma, he was crazy with grief," Mason said.

"I'm surprised to hear you defend him, but I think you're wrong. Anyone can know the right thing to do in calm moments. Knowing the right thing at times of stress, and acting accordingly, that really sorts out individuals."

"Exactly so," Mason said softly.

"Grey never did anything to me, I never even met Julie. So, I sent Jesse away. If I had any idea where he would go, I think I'd tell you."

"I think I'm glad you didn't."

"Do you think he would go to Adam if he could discover where he is?" I asked.

"Ordinarily, I would think not. Adam used Jesse. But in his present state of mind, guessing what he might do is difficult. Jesse doesn't have many places to turn. He doesn't have many relatives and he was never close to any of them."

"Part of me doesn't want to find him. I thought a lot of Jesse."

"You are cursed, Mason."

"When I find him, if I find him, do you want to know. I would allow you visitation prior to podding. Wherever you are, I could send the company plane to bring you. Just make certain I have a way of getting a message to you."

"You can't make things all better no matter what you do."

"I know that. I'm merely trying to make the act I committed against you slightly more humane. I owe you my life and anything good that has come to me since you freed me from stasis."

I was nearly in tears when he finished. Emma felt my emotions, just barely kept in check. She glanced at me."

"I'm sorry. I was being unfair."

Mason shook his white head. "After what I have done to you, I do not deserve your understanding."

"But you have it. That's the amazing lesson I've learned from you, how complicated people can be, and how many secrets have to be unwound before understanding them. I don't regret giving you back your life. For several years, you were a good surrogate father for Jesse and me."

"Thank you."

"But, would I want to see Jesse? I don't know. I'll make sure you have a way to reach me. I don't know what I'll think in a year, or two years or even two weeks. I don't want to see the crazy man who gleefully described his revenge to me. I'd rather remember Jesse as he was."

"What are you going to do, Emma?" I asked.

"Well, I can't stay here."

You're not the only one.

"One thing the world has plenty of is unhappy people. Laura and I are going to set up a counseling practice. We just don't know what part of the country yet."

Nothing will ever be remotely the same again. But when does this raw, fresh, acute agony stop?

"Well, I'm out the door for the last time."

"Emma, please, allow me to help you whenever you think I could."

"Poor Mason. I will. You need to do something right now for Rebecca. She's doing everything to appear tough and strong so you'll have one less worry. Rebecca, I had to make sure he knew how much you were hurting."

"I understand."

"Take care of each other."

With that, Emma turned and left.

Mason

Emma was right about Rebecca. I had not ignored signs of her pain so much as I had taken her pose of fortitude and strength at face value. She had taken on a lot and not complained, but no one can keep absorbing emotional pain indefinitely. We all have limits.

"What do you need me to do?"

"One thing, and one thing only. Leave this place."

"I cannot do that with Jesse free."

"You might never find him."

"True. But shouldn't I try?"

"It would be hard for you to do otherwise."

"I have not obsessed over finding Adam. I've left that task to others, haven't I?"

"I'll give you that. Adam's always been more obsessed with you than you have been with him."

"Allow me a chance, not an open-ended one, to run down Jesse, and then, I swear, I will look seriously at leaving."

"That's fair. I'm going to go hide in the dark for a while before going back to my lab. I don't want anyone to see me after I've been crying."

KAREN – THE FOLLOWING TWO PARTS, REBECCA AND MASON SHOULD BE RELOCATED. I FOUND A PLACE FOR THEM. USE YOUR NAME TO SEARCH.

Rebecca

"Do you ever have any guilt about the work you used to do here?" Rob asked.

I hesitated before answering, wondering where my answer was intended to take the conversation. I had come to the cafeteria to consume a salad, not for a serious discussion of the sins of Genomex with Rob.

"Some. Even in the first weeks I was here, I had suspicions about what was going on. Things weren't completely right. You can't work in a place like this and not notice things going on just beneath the surface."

"You weren't here in the late 1970s and early 1980s when we were actively making the Children of Genomex. You can honestly claim not to have been part of that."

"Unlike some."

Rob shook his head. "Adam's claim that his research was hijacked and perverted in ways he knew nothing about is one of the most absurd lies I've heard in my life. Adam and Breedlove ran Genomex. Adam knew everything. Adam worked with Ashlocke the first month he was here."

"Of course he did. But I think he eventually talked himself into believing his own lie. Maybe he could not live with himself any other way. Even Breedlove's guilt caught up with him at the end."

"For me, the worst part was going home after what I did all day long, and seeing my perfect, healthy daughters with their uncorrupted DNA. After a day of determining the best way to alter the DNA of other peoples' children-to-be, I could barely look at my own."

"What are your girls doing now?"

"I don't know. My ex-wife managed something of a vanishing act. After 1994, I could not find them anywhere."

"That sounds illegal."

"It probably is. My child support checks went uncashed. After a while, I deposited the money into accounts that have accumulated interest all these years, and kept them in the girls' names. They've never surfaced to claim anything."

I hesitated for a moment, then made what to me was an obvious suggestion. "You should ask Mason to look for them. He can find all kinds of things and people."

I was sure of this. I would never have said anything otherwise. After seeing the way Mason brought Catherine into his family, yes, he would help Rob look for his lost daughters. Even if he discovered they had died with their mother in an accident in 1994, Rob would be better off knowing what happened.

"I'm sorry, Rebecca, but when I interviewed here, he seemed so…cold. I can't imagine him helping anybody. Do you really think he would help? "

I sighed. "I assure you, if you tell him you're looking for your daughters, he will help you. He'll be very formal, but family means a great deal to him."

"Company lore said he had nothing to do with his kids after the divorce."

"That isn't true. Not at all true. Mason maintained close, almost daily contact while they were growing up. I saw this. He's very complicated, Rob. And very private."

"Why would he want people to believe he abandoned them, except for the money? When we were neighbors, he lived for those kids. I could never understand the change."

"He had good reasons for creating that impression."

Rob digested that idea. Even though it ran counter to what he believed for more than 20 years, it made sense. Rob could be persuaded if presented with evidence.

I continued. "Nothing changed, just appearances. He did not want his enemies to be able to threaten his children as a means of manipulating him. He wanted to be unassailable."

"There is some sense to that. Are you sure you of this? How did he communicate?"

"Communication was the easiest part. They all had webcams. He even helped them with their homework."

"That sounds like my old neighbor."

"Mason's children never ceased being important to him." Ordinarily I did not volunteer so much information about Mason, but Rob had known him years before Incident X, and the current visits of the children were not a secret, but openly conducted.

"Now that they're grown, they visit us. I know what they tell me about the years before I knew them. Rob, Mason will help you."

"Sounds like you've gotten yourself a complicated life."

"It's not the life I thought I would live, but things rarely work as we planned them."

Mason

I ignored my sudden weight loss, hoping it would stop without intervention. I knew better, of course, but I did not want to admit to myself what my loss implied.

Keeping weight on or gaining it required me to consume ordinary foods, richly laden with fats and oils. To achieve the same effect with the pink slurry required me to drink great quantities, and that I could not do. Nausea was a commonplace of my life, but now I was having trouble keeping down the pink slurry.

All of this implied a relapse.

Dr Prodana appeared bored as I related symptoms.

We're talking about my life slipping away, doctor. Couldn't you feign a small measure of interest or curiosity?

"Anything else?" she yawned.

"Am I boring you, doctor?"

"No."

"Try not to appear as if I'm putting you to sleep. I'm developing the same symptoms presented when I nearly died in 1991. This is a matter of deep interest to me."

Dr Prodana's duties were light. Her primary responsibility was monitoring and managing my health.

"Very well. Let's assume you are going into a serious relapse. I want to weigh you three times a day, start you on some newer antibiotics, and ask that you maintain your distance from people. I will review Breedlove's treatments again to be sure I am not missing something."

The passage of time generates curious effects. Those people we once saw daily leave our lives, and upon returning, seeing them once again becomes an extraordinary event.

Robert Abelmann, many lifetimes ago, had been my neighbor when we both had lawns to mow and bedding flowers to plant. I could hardly imagine that ancient time, when Grey played with Rob's two daughters. Recalling that life now with clarity was impossible; all of it comes back to me soft and worn around the edges. I do not think of those days much anymore than I must, because the memories inevitably lead to recall of the night I came home late from Genomex to a house stripped of furnishings and family, stripped of everything but my clothes.

By that time, Rob had gone through his own divorce hell and had left the neighborhood.

I avoid reminders of those days. Some memories are like abcesses that never heal.

I had avoided Rob since his return to Genomex for that reason, and for one other. I had once abused my authority, and delved into Rob's relationship with Rebecca, misusing company resources to answer my own questions. The records were long since destroyed, and my misdeeds were 20 years in the past, but my memory was intact and whole.

I could rationalize what I had done as the ill-considered action of a man whose cells were swimming in pharmaceuticals. Breedlove at one time had me taking 19 distinct medications daily. However, that is less than honest. I was quite simply, quite humanly jealous. But that did not justify what I did.

Rob had requested an appointment with me and I had granted it. Now, I wanted to get the meeting over with as quickly as possible.

Rob presented himself promptly at the appointed hour. I was relieved when he entered my office without a corporate grin. We didn't need to begin the meeting with a lie.

He looked better than he had at his interview. Some of the uncertainty was gone from his eyes. He might never regain the personal confidence he owned in the days when he rivaled Adam.

"Good morning, Mason."

Shaking my gloved hand disturbed him, as it did most people. Maybe they would feel better if they knew how frequently I changed them. Or maybe not.

"Rebecca thought you could help me."

Unpleasant thoughts rose unbidden. I said nothing, but fixed my gaze on him. That was sufficient to throw most people off balance and leave me in peace soon after.

"You remember my daughters?"

"Of course."

"I want to find them. I haven't had contact in 17 years. My ex-wife vanished about that time and took my daughters with her."

Rob loved those girls. Had things happened as he said, that explained part of his earlier unraveling at Genomex.

"They're adults now, closer to 30 than 20."

"Yes."

If anyone could find lost daughters for Rob, it's me. I can find almost anyone.

"What if they don't want you to find them?"

"Even if my ex-wife lied and told them that I cut off support, I can prove otherwise. When they vanished, I had an attorney set up accounts for them that I could not touch. The dates and amounts I paid in are carefully documented."

"You might need that kind of documentation to get them to listen to you."

"How do you cope with Jackie?"

"I don't. She's dead."

I will not even pretend any sorrow. Miserable, shallow woman. Not even her gold seahorse bathroom fixtures made her happy.

The silence was awkward for Rob. I did not care.

"Do you think you can help?"

"Get me a list, as detailed as you can manage, of complete names, past addresses, and Social Security numbers. I will do what I can, but I cannot promise a happy ending. Have you considered that something may have happened to all three of them at the same time?"

"I've considered that."

"That's an unlikely finding, but it is best to be prepared."

"I've exhausted every public source of information."

"I have many other sources."

Rebecca

All my life I've been a very reliable person. Good Old Reliable Rebecca. Most people take my attitude for granted. The times I've had to stop delivering some people were stunned and amazed to discover I no longer had the patience to be used and taken for granted.

Mason wasn't that way. He had lived too long in his personal wilderness to take people for granted.

Reliable as I am, as I carried the ashes of Mason's grandson back to our quarters, I felt not at all like myself. I carefully tucked the jar into a drawer where Mason kept the residue of generations of Greys and a handful of Eckharts. Then I left, got in my car, and started driving.

I went and visited paintings I loved in a museum. That may sound peculiar to some, but I'd known these paintings since my first years at Genomex, and going back to seeing old friends once more. This was so calming, I considered going back to Genomex to get in a few hours of productive work. Everything began falling apart when I got back into my car, and began driving to work, to home, and the thought that Genomex had become my home was simply unbearable.

There weren't many places for me to go. Neither Mason nor I was a very social creature. I found myself sitting in Laura Varady's driveway. I needed to talk to someone and that someone could not be Mason because he already had enough burdening him.

Had I known what things she had said to Mason, I would not have been there or gone up and rung the doorbell. I likely never would have spoken to her again. Laura was motherly towards everyone; however, Mason had lost his mother at a young age and his relationship with Laura Varady was very important. She must have known she would traumatize him with the way she ended their friendship. But I knew nothing about what happened, not then.

No wonder she looked so surprised to find me on her doorstep.

"Come in, Rebecca."

I started crying immediately. How very sloppy of me. I felt like a fool, but Laura didn't laugh.

Laura made a pot of tea and we went outside to her garden, planted to attract butterflies and hummingbirds. We sat down in a pair of Adirondack chairs, real ones made of wood, not molded plastic.

"What is it, Rebecca? Has Mason done something to you?"

"No. Not Mason. Mason's never done anything cruel to me, maybe because so many things have been done to him. No, this is about something horrific done to Mason that I witnessed."

Laura looked surprised. Emma must not have said anything about Jesse's sick revenge.

"You'll have to bring me up to speed. No one has told me about anything important happening lately.

Fortunately, she knew who Julie was so there was little to explain beyond the fact of her pregnancy. The story itself was simple enough. In no time I had related the tale of Jesse murdering Mason's grandson.

I did not tell her about what Mason and I did with the body. I was certain we had broken several laws, and I didn't want to get into that.

"I feel like my mind is overloaded with terrible things. I think I know most every dark and dreadful deed committed at Genomex."

"Anyone who was part of Mason's life would have familiarity with the past sins of Genomex.. I think Mason did the right thing unearthing the secrets and not leaving them to be found maybe decades later, but involving himself so deeply was unhealthy. He did not create those unfortunates or cause them to be created."

I shrugged. "He felt responsible to handle things with decency as soon as he realized what was hidden in the sublevels."

"Mason might be a more content man if he was not so responsible. You don't need to answer this question, but I'm curious. Does Mason have nightmares about perverse Genomex science?"

"No. He has nightmares about Marcus."

"Ah. Twins have a special bond. Mason and Marcus together would have endured childhood better than Mason alone, but that was not to be."

"I still wonder how Marilyn Eckhart could commit suicide and abandon her surviving son."

"Mason remembers some question about that at the time, that perhaps she had some 'help', something about the way she was found. The police appeared unconvinced, he recalls, but nothing came of it. I've seen photos of her. She was a pretty young woman. Mason remembers her happiest when Connor Eckhart was sent overseas and Marilyn and the boys lived with relatives."

"Mason told me years ago that his father was a jealous man. He has vague memories of coming home to an argument with his father accusing his mother of unfaithfulness. I suspect Connor was jealous of the attention she paid to his own sons. Initially, a possessive, jealous man can make some women feel highly valued and much-loved. Unfortunately, such men are not inclined to trust their womenfolk to be faithful. Behavior once flattering becomes oppressive."

"Oppressive enough to abandon their own children by way of suicide?"

"You haven't heard the stories I've heard over the years of guys who demanded explanations of odometer readings of their wives' cars, wanting to know where they went, what they did, why they did it, who they saw, who they talked to. I knew of one character who recorded his wife's phone calls. She only talked to her mother and two sisters, and there was never a suggestion of evidence that she was fooling around, but the lunacy continued."

"What happened?"

"The wife stuck it out until their youngest child started college. She filed for divorce the next day."

"We'll never know what Marilyn went through, will we?"

"No, but it must have been horrendous. Mason remembers his mother as loving, kind, and not just to her twins, but to neighbor's children, injured animals, and her elderly relatives."

"Damn shame she didn't marry someone who deserved her."

"Yes." Dr Varady paused. Rebecca, I've done something I'm ashamed of. Mason came to my office. I lost control and said some bad things to him. I knew better, but I've been so upset about Emma. I just vented. That isn't professional of me. Mason just stood there and took it."

"That's his way. He thinks of you as a kind of surrogate mother. He's never said it out loud, but it's so obvious."

"I wish I could apologize…Mason was such a kind, decent man when I met him. You've been good for him; he was getting back to being who he used to be, at least in the company of a handful of people. I cannot forget Emma's face that afternoon, and then I feel betrayed and heartbroken all over again. Then, I'm not sure who Mason is. I'm going to say something that may offend, but for your sake, I need to say it: aren't you just a little afraid of Mason now?"

"For a few, fleeting moments, yes, I was. Then the fear vanished. He acted out of a sense of duty, not in an emotional rage. Guilt is affecting him physically. He had not been able to consume whole food since that day, and he's not keeping down much of Prodana's 'milkshakes'. A guilt-free man would terrify me, but that's not Mason. No, Mason will not harm me."

"Well, that's reassuring. I've been worried about you. What are you doing right now, Rebecca?"

"Avoiding going back to Genomex."

"Avoiding Mason?"

"Oh, no. I want to drag him away from that place permanently. He talks about leaving."

"He does?"

"Yes."

"I'm stunned. He has made progress with you. I always thought he planned to die at Genomex."

"We have house plans we developed with an architect. The plans are done with a three-dimensional program allowing you to try different orientations of the sun to see what the rooms would look like over the course of a year. The images can be rotated, and you can 'walk' through the rooms."

"That's healthy and positive. What would you do about Mason's unique health problems?"

"Dismantle the steel cave, reassemble it elsewhere, and build the house around it."

"Of course."

"The cave originally was brought to Genomex on flatbed trucks. It can leave the same way. I'd like to see it hauled at least a thousand miles in any direction."

"You really want to get away from Genomex."

"In the worst way. I want Mason to get away from the place where his life went wrong and where so many bad memories began."

"Not a bad idea at all

"We both have books we want to write, and Mason wanted to have time to be with his grandchildren…if there are going to be any grandchildren. I feel like I'm on real-life horror overload, Laura. I know there are millions of people in this world who have experienced much worse, but…"

She interrupted me. "You've been around Mason the stoic too long. Yes, there are people who have known worse, but that does not make your experiences tame and lightweight, or easy to handle."

"I'll never forget the look on Julie's face when she realized her baby was gone, but she could not understand what had happened."

"Is Julie damaged internally?"

"I don't know."

"And how is Mason coping?"

"Not well. He's very good at not betraying himself…except with me. Other people might not see it, but Mason's having a difficult time."

"What do you think he'll do?"

"Find Jesse. If Jesse can be found, Mason will ferret him out."

"And what are you going to do?"

"I can't do what I want to do. I'd like to leave Genomex now."

"I'm glad I'm out of there. I should have bailed after the first six months."

"Mason says the same thing. Rarely has so much unhappiness emerged from one place. I need time away to think…to not have to be there, at Genomex, 24 hours a day."

"Well, you could stay here for a while. It's not like I don't have plenty of room."

I thought about it for a moment, but only a moment. "That would be wonderful."

I couldn't just not-go-home and start staying with Laura. Some things must be explained in person. Some people must receive explanations in person, or they will very likely conclude the Wrong Things.

Hardly anyone can imagine Mason vulnerable. I was never one of those people. I think I always knew there was a human inside of him…somewhere.

"Mason, you won't like this, but I need to spend some time away from Genomex." His sudden grim expression told me that he did not understand, and that he was Making Bad Assumptions. "I am not leaving you. I just cannot be here 24 hours a day, just for a little while."

"I don't know what to think."

"If I had all of my wishes, I'd want us both to get away from the site for a while, together, but that isn't practical. Unfortunately."

"Why now?"

"Everywhere I go here, I see things that bring to mind the consequences of perverted science."

"I have some pleasant memories here."

I should have chosen my words more carefully.

"As do I…but so much has happened recently, I feel like I'm on Genomex overload. Mason, I am NOT leaving you. Put that out of your mind. I didn't run when you told me about Breedlove and the canine feral, and I didn't run after the mess with Emma. I will never abandon you. I can't imagine leaving you unless you said you wanted me gone."

"Living here is claustrophobic. You've tolerated it better than I imagined. Can I call you every night?"

"Yes. Of course. I want you to do that. This is not about time away from you. This is about time away from Genomex. Please look over the house plans while I am away."

That last line was code-language for 'seriously consider retirement' without using the r-word.

"It's going to seem strange," he said.

"To me, too. And don't be a stoic. If you need me, call. I'll be only a few miles away, not on the other side of the world. Call anytime of the night. I'll be here in 20 minutes or less."

He smiled faintly. "Just sort out things quickly, will you?"

"I promise."

"When you're done, we'll use some vacation days and take extended day trips. Fair enough?"

"Fair enough."

Rebecca

Under Laura Varady's roof, I awoke each morning to birdsong because the windows were open. I went to see to the chorus of crickets and cicadas. Rediscovering these sounds, sounds once familiar and loved, I realized I had missed them.

Little of the outside world reached Mason and me inside our steel cave. The laminated glass window stopped any sound from the outside except the ascent and landing of the GSA helicopter 15 meters away, just out of sight. The only interior sounds came from fans, dozens of fans, fans moving filtered air, fans in computers, fans cooling electronics, generating a soft, muted background hum.

A handful of times, the power failed. The sudden silence was incredible, but never lasted long. The steel cave had two sets of power backups; they took a few seconds to come online.

Laura's house had wooden floorboards that squeaked, and tree branches that scraped against the side of the house in the wind. The steel cave produced no such noises.

The cave was nearly odorless, except when we disinfected all the surfaces, and that dissipated quickly since the air was exchanged frequently.

At Laura's, the scent of wet earth after the rain flowed to me through the open windows.

When I realized how much I missed these things, I felt disloyal to Mason. That could not be helped. I liked the sounds, the scents, the ordinariness of Laura's house. But I missed Mason immeasurably more.

I thought about Rob's comment implying a compromise by having a relationship with Mason. Did Rob understand at all who I was, or did he only project upon me the woman he wanted me to be? Even when we dated 20 years ago, I had been different, even for a nerdette. Rob wanted to get back to having a home with someone, someone conventional, and I could never be that someone.

No, I "settled" when I married my gelding Jeff, a mistake I would not repeat. I had not "settled" with Mason. Far from it. Mason and I were both eccentrics. There weren't many people in the world capable of putting up with either one of us.

KAREN – MOVE THE HIGHLIGHTED PORTIONS HERE!

No matter how smart you are, you cannot know everything. I knew that. I am even well aware –usually—of my shortcomings and blind spots. But not always. I should have been more observant or less naïve or some combination of both. But I wasn't.

Rob wasn't a bad guy, not in the sense of being devious and conniving. He started showing up in my lab just before lunch and we'd go down to the cafeteria together. Rob was one of the most brilliant individuals I had known in my lifetime, and he could talk about things outside of his specialty.

I've worked primarily with men all of my adult lifetime. By necessity, if I was going to have buddies, a lot of them would be male. That's all they ever were to me, all I ever wanted them to be. So, I failed to reflect much upon 'buddy' Rob, or perhaps I did not want to, since dealing with the situation would require some unpleasantness.

After I crashed with Dr Varady, Rob must have found out almost immediately although I failed to connect that with his more frequent visits to my lab. I have always been a miserable failure reading this kind of thing.

Only when Dr Varady answered her phone one evening and found Rob asking for me did I allow the thought to cross my mind.

Naïve me, I assumed he must be calling about some results not delivered at the promised time.

"Rob, if this is about the samples that were supposed to be done today, we had instrument problems. My technician ordered a replacement part for morning delivery. She'll install it as soon as it shows, and your work will be first in line."

"I just wanted to talk."

"Well, I really don't have time for that. Good evening."

I rolled my eyes at Laura, who made a blunt observation.

"Knowing Mason as I do –no matter what I think of him now—if he concludes that you have betrayed him, as Jackie did, he could shut down his emotions completely and never be reachable again. Remember, his mother chose to abandon him by suicide and Jackie left him for Adam. He almost expects you to abandon him. Don't let him think you are doing this, not if you care about him. Don't even let him begin to think this way, because he will require so little persuasion to believe it."

"What does Rob think he's doing?" I was annoyed. In my mind, I had not offered Rob any encouragement.

"Staking out new turf. He thinks you're on the way to being free. Are you?"

"No. I don't need this."

"Rob thinks otherwise. You've got the problem."

An old panic flooded my thoughts, an old fear of people and of being caught up and involved with lives I wanted no part of.

"Sometimes, I wish I had stayed with my old life, or run away from this one." Part of me was always prepared for flight.

"No you don't."

"Yes, I do. All those terrible, strange things that keep happening to me. I'm tired of strange things happening to me, Laura."

"You knew Mason was not going to be easy."

"Of course I knew." I had no illusions about Mason. He was always truthful about himself with me. If he hadn't been honest, when bizarre stories reached me about him, I wouldn't be able to sort fact from fiction. Had he presented himself to me as better than he was, I would quickly have learned to distrust him. He knew that.

"You took a great chance."

"Mostly, I've been right, until now. I'm sure of one thing, Laura. I cannot go back to living the way I was. I know too much about Genomex. Everywhere I go, I am reminded of something unwholesome and dark, some hideous perversion of science and technology. My life has to change."

"After what your doctors told you, I think that's a given."

"I think it's time to go...home, and convince Mason we both need to change our lives."

"He's a stubborn creature. What if he won't change and he won't leave Genomex? He feels personally bound to this project and uniquely suited to carry it out. He may be correct."

"Staying on at Genomex will kill Mason."

"I agree. You're not the first person to believe that. I'm just not sure you can convince him."

"Neither am I."

"What will you do?"

"Probably get a job in another city and have a long-distance marriage."

"I've seen people try that. It's difficult."

"I won't abandon him. I just cannot live and work at Genomex. Thanks for putting me up, Laura."

"I enjoyed the company."

I went to work the next morning, my things packed in the trunk of my car, and buried myself in paperwork, in reality putting off what I had to do and did not care to face, out of fear of disappointment. I had walked in through the door eager to see Mason, and talk to him, but I kept putting it off.

There was a real possibility Mason would choose to stay at Genomex, even after I made clear that I could not remain. I ran through the possible ways things could turn. The more I considered the possibilities the less confident I became of the outcome, dreading more and more what I believed was inevitable rejection.

I looked up from my desk, and was astonished to see Rob standing there.

"What do you want, Rob?"

"It's lunchtime."

"It is?" I glanced at my watch. "It is." I was ducking doing the scary stuff in a big way. Coward.

"I know you've been staying with Laura Varady."

"So? That is my business."

"I'll be blunt. Does this mean you're leaving Mason?"

"O Dear God," I muttered, as I did realizing I was using Mason's phrase.

"Rebecca, you're a lovely, vital woman. You shouldn't waste your life as Mason Eckhart's roommate."

Rob was utterly sincere. He believed he knew the truth. He was also being highly offensive.

"Rob, you're way out of line. So far out of line that you cannot imagine."

"I knew him before, Rebecca, back in the 1980s. He wasn't 'Mr Personality' then. It's common knowledge around here that as a consequence of his condition human emotions were burned out of him." Rob paused. "And that he cannot have sex." He paused again. "Well?"

My private life was just that—private—but all kinds of stories and speculation circulated about Mason and me. Some stories were lurid, showing a high degree of imagination and creativity. Few hinted at the plain, unsensational truth.

I stared at Rob, wanting to retain control and remain civil, while still putting him in his place. "I'm straining to compose a tasteful response. I know contemporary cultural norms allow for considerable vulgarity and crudity in conversations, but I hold myself to a standard well above the cultural norms."

"That's something I've always admired about you."

"What if I told you, not that you deserve the information, that local 'common knowledge' is utter hogwash, the confabulation of creative but uninformed gossip-mongers?"

"I'd think you were trying to save face and salvage your dignity."

"Rob…" Why was it so difficult for people to accept the straightforward truth?

"I just don't understand why you would…settle."

Once upon a time in my life, prior to learning patience and control of my temper, I would have responded to Rob by verbally chewing his head off.

"I'm trying my best not to scream at you, Rob. You probably won't believe that I've never attempted to correct any 'obvious' impressions because they are all part of how Mason controls this organization…and what goes on between us is nobody's business but ours."

There was a flicker of doubt in his eyes. He knew I habitually told the truth. He looked deeply puzzled. Rob was not an emotional man; the data points did not come together the way his careful prior calculations projected. Rob studied my face as if he expected to find all the answered inscribed there. I could not stand the silence.

"Mason and I are not roommates, Rob. I don't owe you that much information, but maybe this is the only way you'll understand. What do we have drummed into our skulls about solutions to problems? Consider the simplest explanation first, before the obscure and arcane."

Rob looked stunned. "I had no idea. I feel like an idiot."

"As well you should. I don't ever want to hear another word about this again. I'm not eating lunch today, Rob."

"Why not?"

"Because I am not hungry and because I have too much to do here."

"Then just have a salad. Can't spend your whole day at your desk. Come on."

I can do what pleases me.

On the edge of vision at the doorway, I perceived movement, dark movement, and I knew exactly what it was. Mason turned before I could say anything, but what I saw scared me: he looked gaunt and frail, and once more was relying upon a cane.

What has happened to you?

He stalked off, and I could hear him moving quickly away.

Rob rolled his eyes at me, and shook his head.

"Damn." I rose from my desk chair and pushed past Rob, leaving my lab. But I couldn't tell which way Mason had gone. I turned and came back into my lab.

I was angry. Without asking, there was no telling what Mason was thinking, but given his history, he was probably thinking the worst and assuming another betrayal and abandonment.

"Rob, while we're wallowing in honestly, why don't you tell me what became of the VCR I loaned you in 1993 so you could copy tapes?"

"That was twenty years ago!"

"Yes, and the VCR was nearly new."

"I thought you gave it to me."

"Uh, no, Rob, I hadn't been working here for long, and money was tight."

"I'm sorry."

"Sorry enough to replace it?" I asked.

"They're not made anymore."

"DVD recorders are. You could glide on down to Electronics Valhalla on Hamilton Road and pick up one since you have no one to eat lunch with. Oh, and some blank disks would be nice, too. Good ones."

"You're serious."

"I am." I was. Now, I really wanted that recorder.

"What would you do with one?"

"You have no idea. And that's not the point. The point is that you owe me a recording device."

Rob sighed. His temper was fraying, too, but he knew I wasn't asking anything unreasonable.

"I'll see what I can manage.

Rob stomped out of my lab. Whether he glided over to Electronics Valhalla or not, he would not darken my lunches again.

Now I had to go find Mason, immediately, before he brooded and reached too many incorrect conclusions. I steeled myself to the task, and pushed back from my desk to rise.

Then my phone rang.

Rebecca

When Catherine called from the airport and asked me to come pick her up, I knew something had happened. She was in mid-term, her courses were going well, and she just didn't fly home without any warning.

She was waiting with a single suitcase when I arrived. As we made our way out of the terminal, Catherine spoke very little. The place was too noisy for conversation, anyway.

"Do you want to stop somewhere to eat? A late lunch?"

"That would be great."

"We'll stop somewhere between the airport and Genomex. I didn't have any lunch, either."

Out beyond the throngs of people, deep inside the concrete cavern of the parking garage, we were in a circumstance that could be considered private.

Like her father, Catherine got directly to whatever was on her mind. I have little patience for social rituals and appreciated the directness of both of them. It saved so much time.

"Aren't you going to ask me why I'm here in the middle of the week?"

"I thought you would tell me when you were ready, or perhaps you wanted to talk to Mason first. I'm anxious and concerned, but you know I don't pry. I want people to tell me only those things they are comfortable sharing."

"Actually, I wanted to talk to you first."

Catherine surprised and flattered me with that comment. Our relationship, illegitimate daughter and second, late wife, offered all manner of negative possibilities, none of them realized. I did not want to take Danielle's place, but to be a kind of long-lost, unsuspected auntie she trusted. I had my wish.

"We can talk anytime. Tonight. Now. I'll listen."

"I broke up with Patrick. I found him with somebody else."

Wretched savior of the beasts. You were never good enough for Catherine. Now, she knows that, too.

"I'm sorry, Catherine."

"You were both right about him."

"That's a miserable way to find out. After they betray your trust, everything changes, doesn't it?"

"Yeah. But there's more. I became pregnant."

I stopped and turned towards Catherine. "Genomex is the last place on earth for you. Catherine, if you want this child to live, I'll help you any way I can, whatever you need, beginning with a warning about telling Mason."

Catherine smiled weakly. "Thank you, Rebecca. I became pregnant, but I'm not any longer. I did not want the child, and not just because I understand the need to protect the human gene pool."

I started walking again. "You went through all of this by yourself?"

"Yeah."

"You're a strong woman, Catherine. I respect your strength, but I wish I could have been there with you."

"So much has been going wrong here that I didn't want to add more distress. I wanted to tell you both in person, and I didn't want to present Mason with another pregnant mutant. I wanted to come home and be able to tell you both, 'This is what happened, this is what I did about it, and I hope you aren't too disappointed with me or my lousy judgment.'"

"That's a lot to take on, but for your father's sake, it's probably a good thing. He hasn't said anything to you about his health, has he?"

"No."

"I thought not. Catherine, after years of hard-won, gradual improvement, Mason's having a relapse. Even before Emma's pregnancy, he was having trouble with whole food. He's lost a lot of weight. Prodana is feeding him enough calories to fuel a lumberjack. All the recent stress and distress has to be making things worse. I am trying to convince him to retire."

"Good luck. That won't be easy."

"No." It might be impossible.

"Maybe I can help." Catherine smiled a sly little conspiratorial smile. She had none of his features, but that sneaky smile was pure Mason.

"Thanks."

Up ahead, in the gloom of the garage, someone strolled out in front of us. Something about him was vaguely familiar.

Adam. Adam blocked the way ahead.

"This is a real stroke of luck, Rebecca. We followed you from Genomex, and decided to hang around when you went into short-term parking."

Catherine and I kept on walking the last few steps to reach my car.

"How nice for you, Adam. Unfortunately, neither of us has time to chat with you about old times." I had the key in my hand to open the trunk. If I could just casually pop open the trunk, and lift in Catherine's suitcase…my automatic was inside, tucked against a wheel.

"I thought I was going to have to corner you in a public place, like a restaurant, but I couldn't have asked for better than this. I've had you and your car watched for days, Rebecca."

None of this sounded promising. I leaned down to open the trunk.

"Kurt, John, direct Dr Steyn and Ms Hartman out towards the plane."

No, this did not sound promising. I turned to look behind the way we had come, and saw a pair of tall, very healthy looking young men wearing bland, unremarkable clothes. They did not have the look of thugs, but clearly they must be. And something else: they looked enough alike to be brothers. Where did Adam find these young guys willing to serve him with violence?

Ordinarily, I was armed. I carried identification confirming my status as a GS agent, which I was, by training. I could have entered the terminal armed, and when challenged, prove I was permitted to carry. However, that would have slowed me down, as confirmation of my status was made. I did not want to keep Catherine waiting. So, I left my gun locked in the trunk of my car.

"Adam, is this the best use you can make of your time outside?" I asked.

"Aren't you glad to see me?" he asked sarcastically, dodging any acknowledgment of his time in prison.

"No. Seeing you means a yawn-inducing monologue detailing your latest and greatest adventures pushing back the frontiers of science."

That made him mad. Good. I wanted him off balance.

"Adam, if you think you're going to crawl into my head again, and use me, think again."

Catherine was being extra special stubborn. She sat down on her suitcase, looking like she had settled in for a while. Adam's 'muscle' looked perplexed. Neither Catherine nor I appeared impressed or intimidated by Adam; we were more irritated than anything else.

Adam didn't have time to waste. I don't know if he realized it or not, but the longer we stood (and sat) there, the greater the chances of airport security coming by on a routine patrol.

"John, get Miss Hartman back on her feet. It's time to go."

'John', if that was his name, took one step towards Catherine, then stopped dead as she tossed a cold glare his way. These guys might be big, but they were not trained to push people around.

"Adam, that isn't my name anymore. Do me the courtesy of calling me by my proper name."

"Your proper name?" Adam looked puzzled. I've always enjoyed those moments of Adam-confusion, when he clearly has no idea what is going on. I only wish I had witnessed more of them.

"My name is Catherine Eckhart."

Adam laughed nervously. "No wonder I could not find you. Kurt, John, help Ms Eckhart stand up so we can get out of here."

"Are you sure you want to be involved in a kidnapping?" I asked. " I have the authority of a GS agent. The feds brought in to look for me will be looking for one of their own." Hands on my hips, I smiled sweetly at him. Kurt and John did not move. There was something familiar about Kurt, but I could not quite place where I had seen his face before.

Adam was never a paragon of patience, and predictably, after Kurt and John failed to act, Adam lunged for Catherine, who jumped up and sideways to avoid him.

"Get her suitcase," he barked at Kurt, who did not hesitate to follow Adam's command in this case. Then Adam grabbed me by my right arm, saying, "You always were too much trouble, Rebecca." He nearly caused me to lose my balance. He was hurting me, too, but I did not cry out, not wanting to reveal any sign of weakness.

"I suspect you're going to regret doing this."

"We'll see."

Catherine was following behind without any coercion, avoiding contact with John and Kurt.

"Go stealth and get help!"

"I can go stealth anytime, but if I leave you, I'm not sure I'd have any way of finding you, and I don't want to lose my not-evil stepmother." She smiled.

Adam dragged me out of the parking garage and into the daylight. Then we proceeded across country into an open, mowed grassy area. Adam pushed me ahead, making me fall…onto a metallic ramp I could not see.

But the Flying Sow no longer exists.

"Now, we're going somewhere I think you will find very interesting, Rebecca."

He dragged me back to my feet, up the ramp, and 'inside', now suddenly visible, and pushed me into a chair.

"Keep your hands off of me, Adam." Always unsubtle, aren't you? Better watch your back; if I can make you pay for that, I will.

Catherine sagged down into a chair across from me. "I saw the Sow cut up and hauled away on a flatbed truck. Where did you get this?" She just wasn't afraid of Adam.

"You'll see, Catherine."

I was surprised to see John and Kurt sitting up front and not Adam. Adam was not even instructing them. They made their way at very low altitude until well clear of the local flight paths. Only then did the pseudo-Sow begin to gain altitude and speed.

I reflected upon our situation. It was not good. No one knew I had gone to the airport. No one knew Catherine would be there. If anyone talked to Dr Varady, she would tell them I had made a decision, but thought I had gone to work. It would look as if I had run off. It could be a miserably long while before Mason could be sure something had happened to me, and I had not vanished by choice. It would take some time before my car was found at the airport. Passenger lists would have to be searched...well, there just weren't many suggestions to indicate what had happened, except one: there would be no record of my purchasing a ticket, but there would be one of Catherine's ticket. That bill would come to Mason, just not anytime soon. A day or even longer might go by before anyone even thought about looking for me. I resolved to not allow Adam to know this; it would please him too greatly.

I was relieved when Adam did not slap 'visual cloaks' on us. Contrary to what many believe, even with a good map and great visibility, it is difficult to determine where one is from the air. I resolved to relax and try to spare myself some small amount of stress until we got to whatever wonderful place Adam was taking us.

Well, I tried to relax, but after viewing Adam's desperate acts, I realized he had little more to lose by committing another crime. He had reasons to resent Catherine and me; he had motivation to harm us: revenge upon Mason. Catherine and I were in deep trouble.

Catherine never was too cautious about what she said, even now. "Adam, why can't you just leave us alone?"

"Because Eckhart wouldn't leave me alone."

"He had a duty to see you arrested for stealing from Genomex. He would have been negligent if he hadn't."

That made Adam angry. He probably thought of Catherine in terms of the young girl he had thieving scientific supplies for him. She was a different Catherine now, confident of who she was, someone Adam had not anticipated.

"I put a lot of myself into Genomex and I was never compensated adequately for the job I did."

Adam, stop living in fantasies.

"Rationalization. After all the damage you did to people and all the money Genomex has poured into undoing some of that damage, putting together places like St Kat's, you should be paying money back to Genomex."

"What the hell is St Kat's?" he asked.

"A state of the art hospital dedicated to the treatment of conditions unique to Genomex mutants, " I informed him. "Some of the staff are themselves mutants."

Adam glared at me. Reality was not improving his disposition. How could he not have heard about the hospital?

"I'm supposed to believe that?"

"If you haven't heard of St Kat's, you must not have many contacts left among honest mutants."

I did not need to see Catherine's face to see her smirking at him.

"I've been in prison."

"That's where you belong," Catherine said.

"That's harsh. If not for the memory of Danielle…"

"You deserve it. Adam, you make things up as you go along, to suit the moment." Catherine sighed.

"We used to be friends. I even took you in when you had nowhere else to go."

I wasn't going to let that go by without a comment. I had no way to prove it, but I believed Adam unraveled Catherine's pedigree in 2007 when told Catherine wasn't his, and he got around to sharing those data only when sharing was useful to him.

"Catherine always had a place to go. You just didn't bother letting her know about it."

Catherine was not done with Adam. "All the time I was growing up, my mother told me about how special you were. Then when she saw you again, you let her believe you'd call or do something. Well, after you shipped us off into 'the underground', Mom could never get a decent job and we lived on the edge of survival. Did you ever look into the kinds of lives you were sending people into? Did you ever think of checking to see how Mom and I were doing?"

I was surprised by all of this. That Catherine resented Adam for using her I knew well, but she had never said much about that part of her life with Danielle. I realized few Genomex mutants said much about 'the underground', and they did not speak well of that time.

"Danielle always had a lot of boyfriends. I didn't think she'd miss me."

I shook my head slowly. "Mason says you blight every life you touch. He's right."

"Rebecca, you talk too much."

I turned to Catherine. "I had no idea Adam's 'underground' was such a step down."

Adam turned around in his seat, but said nothing. Surely he knew what kind of lives he was sending people off to live? Or didn't he care?

"It was even worse than that. Sometimes we didn't have enough to eat. I'm not exaggerating."

"I believe you."

"Money was always tight, and we were almost always on the move. We ate whenever and wherever we could. It was nothing like the life we had before Mom got really sick."

Catherine made steady eye contact with Adam. I was sure he would say something, but he kept silent. "Mom always thought Adam would come along and take us back to Sanctuary. But he never really cared. Not once did he contact Mom to see how we were."

At that, Adam turned away from Catherine. Did Adam feel some small measure of guilt?

"If Mason had known…"

"I know. You don't need to tell me. I know."

The pseudo-Sow slowed drastically, then hovered; we descended slowly down, first to ground level, then into a hole in the ground, a roughly cut passage straight down into the earth. Adam had another hole in the ground to hide in? Is that why we could not find him? What is it with Adam and holes in the ground?

We came to rest in a man-made cavern with a flat floor covered with concrete, and walls rising at right angles from the floor. The hangar was awash with light.

Lilith

Adam was highly strung and pompous beyond measure, but he did have his uses. I quickly discovered he could make the simplest tasks complex. I sent him on "shopping trips" to Genomex and other places, and while he did return with what was needed, he had a habit of bringing back something more than I asked for. Maybe I had not done such a clever thing in breaking Adam out of prison; this time he had brought back bonus people. What was he thinking? Was he thinking? I could hear them all the way back in my lab.

"Adam, get your hands off of me!" The voice was female, and possibly familiar.

"Time with Eckhart never seems to do much for anyone's disposition."

"Adam, make yourself look smarter. Shut up." Here was someone who clearly knew Adam well. And yes, sometimes keeping his mouth closed did make Adam look wiser and less emotional.

Now I was curious to see who would talk back to the great Adam this way. I thought I was unique in speaking to him in that tone of voice.

I emerged from my lab to see Adam half-dragging a fortyish woman through Haven, with a younger woman half her age trailing behind them.

"Or you will do what?" Adam challenged.

She moved very quickly, seizing his right hand, and biting it! Adam howled without restraint. Clearly, she was not in awe of Adam. The younger woman laughed.

"Adam, you were warned."

Leaving Adam swearing and reeling in pain, she continued walking towards me with the other woman close behind.

I know you. And she knew me.

"Lili Chen?"

"Rebecca." I focused back on Adam. "Why have you brought Dr Steyn here? Her expertise has nothing to do with my project."

"You know each other? Did you also know she's Eckhart's wife?"

That was stunning news. I glanced back at Rebecca Steyn. "How bizarre."

"And Adam is jealous," she said, sighing.

I looked at Adam's face, and knew she was telling the truth. I laughed. Adam looked uncomfortable. I liked that. "Adam, we're not set up for…guests. We're going to have to have a little talk about this."

"He wasn't," Rebecca said.

"Adam, was this one of your emotional impulses? Must learn to keep those in check someday." I enjoyed scolding Adam.

"Lili, I've watched her for weeks, waiting for the perfect moment to grab her and bring her here."

"Adam, it's called kidnapping. It's a federal crime. We did not need to give assorted law enforcement agencies another reason to take interest in us."

Rebecca pulled something out of her purse, and held it up. "It's worse than that. Technically, I'm GSA."

I read Rebecca's ID, and handed it back to her. I had no way of knowing if her identification was authentic or not, but what possible reason could she have for carrying false identification?

"Adam, you must stop making our lives more complicated than they need to be."

Dr Steyn replaced the ID, and folded her arms.

She isn't as confident as she appears.

"And who is this," I asked, looking at the younger woman standing beside her.

Adam answered. "Catherine Hartmann."

"My name's Catherine Eckhart," she corrected.

"My stepdaughter," Rebecca added.

"Whatever her name is, with these two we'll have leverage on Eckhart, a means to manipulate him."

"Good Golly, Adam, our work does not involve Genomex mutants! Why would you want to drag Eckhart into our lives? This creates risk for us all. Where did you do this thing?"

"At the airport."

I rolled my eyes. Sometimes, he did not think things through. Adam had carried on a running private, personal war with Mason Eckhart for over a decade, so out of habit he initiated more conflict. Adam did not yet understand that my patience had limits. "Until today, Kurt and John's faces were not recorded anywhere on earth. Now, several federal agencies will be looking for them."

"Rebecca, why do you think Adam brought you here?"

"An emotional impulse," she answered. "Over twenty years later, Adam has not gotten over my lack of interest in becoming the Princess of Genomex. Worse, I chose to date a professional rival of his. Worst of all, years later I married Mason."

I laughed. Rebecca Steyn had a well-earned reputation for blunt honesty. I didn't doubt anything she said. The spectacle of Adam's growing discomfort was amusing. He would tell a very different story, but even without hearing it, I believed Rebecca's version.

"Adam, you've had a more interesting life than you led me to believe."

Rebecca joined right into the spirit of the moment, turning to Adam. "Tell Lili about the time I caught you going through my purse and desk looking for personal information."

"Yes, Adam, I want to hear this." I had dreaded dealing with two unhappy women, but this was amusing.

"I was looking for a report."

Rebecca laughed. "In my purse? That's as lame and absurd as it was in 1992."

"I don't believe you either, Adam." I had to laugh. Perhaps Adam was the smartest man on earth, but I was a woman.

Rebecca had gumption. Deep inside a hollowed out mountain, held captive, and she is humiliating one of her captors. I'm beginning to understand what she and Eckhart see in one another.

'I bring you two useful bargaining chips, and you laugh at me." He sounded genuinely disappointed.

"Nice try, Adam." I turned to Rebecca. "Is your capture on video?"

"In high resolution digital clarity. The airport system was upgraded some years ago. It was a little gloomy in the garage, but I've seen what image enhancement can do."

"Do you see, Adam? Their kidnapping will be reported to the local police and the feds. We don't need that kind of scrutiny." I had no idea what to do with these two, but there was no need to panic them. "I apologize, Rebecca, Catherine. I had no idea Adam was planning anything. This was not my idea."

"Accepted."

"If we're going to have guests, we need to make them comfortable."

"I don't have any clothes," Rebecca said, "Or any civilized niceties, like a toothbrush."

"I've got my things," Catherine said, turning and pointing back towards Matt, who had carried her suitcase.

I turned to Rebecca. "Please make a list of whatever items you need. Adam can go shopping a little later. I'm sure he won't mind. We can order clothes for you and have them shipped overnight. Adam, clear any personal necessities out of your room, and drag one of the futons in there, because that is where Rebecca and Catherine are going to sleep."

"But my computers..."

"Password protected, I assume?"

He nodded. I wasn't convinced. I was so annoyed with him I did not care.

"Where am I going to sleep?"

"I don't know. Wherever you can, I suppose. Where did you think I would put them when you brought them here? Chain them to a wall? Go on. Do it."

Adam sulked off. He was livid, but he wanted no more of this conversation. What he had imagined as a Grand Triumph instead mutated into Humiliation and Ridicule.

I turned back to Rebecca and Catherine. "Come into my lab. We'll talk while I work. I really am sorry about this."

Rebecca looked suspicious. I could not blame her, but she had little choice.

"You're Breedlove's second…android, aren't you?"

I laughed. "Don't worry. Unlike Adam, I am proud of what I am. Imagine: I was designed and crafted over a period of years by one of the great minds of the last century. Intentionally, consciously created, not the result of random lust."

Some part of what I said distressed her. I could not know what it was.

Rebecca sat down on a task chair. Catherine stood beside her, not timidly, but ready to spring to protect her. She cares about Rebecca. They are friends.

"Breedlove learned a lot from building Adam, didn't he?"

"Oh, he did. Adam represents a manipulation of Paul's own DNA. I am different…better. He fashioned me from the most desirable, superior traits of his colleagues…and employees. I am not the child of dozens of parents, but of hundreds, including Dr Eleanor Singer herself. Do you remember her?"

"I did not know Dr Singer. I began working at Genomex in 1992."

Most people are shocked or even disgusted by the idea that an individual could have hundreds of parents. Not this woman; she took it in without hesitation, and went on to the next.

"Ah, then Mother Breedlove was gone a few years before you joined us. A complicated, brilliant woman. She prompted Paul's change of focus from androids to transgenic humans, when she was certain she would never conceive. Do you have children, Rebecca?"

I knew she did not, but I wanted to watch her response. After I said it, I knew I had been needlessly cruel. But I wanted to know her reaction.

"No," she replied softly.

This was an emotional issue for her. "And why? Oh, I am sorry, that is too personal a question."

"I'll answer it. Because the man I married in my youth was unfit to be the father of my children."

Rebecca Steyn's reputation for bluntness was well-deserved.

"And the one you are married to now can never give them to you. That is sad." I meant that.

I was being completely sincere. I was privy to the fact of Mason Eckhart's sterility. Rebecca had been kind to me at Genomex, without knowing of my special relationship with Paul Breedlove. She had no motivation then other than the inclination of her character.

I had my sons, of course, and they were dear to me. However, their creation was more of an engineering project than anything else. Perhaps Rebecca and I shared something now, a lack of children-of-our-own-bodies. Perhaps, like me, she was physically unable to conceive and bear children.

"Yes. Very. Our lives have the oddest ways of working out."

"Even for androids. You and Samihah were both kind to me. Hardly anyone else knew I existed. I was surprised to learn you were more of a hermit than I was."

"Self-protection after bad experiences. I learned from my mistakes, but I try not to remember them any more than I must."

She almost came to tears saying that. Paul told me that Rebecca had come to Genomex after a disastrous early marriage while completing a costly divorce. Someone inflicted profound damage upon her. The nasty ones always do, leaving hearts-in-ruins behind them. I am too rational to ever understand why any creature would do that.

"But, you married again…'Satan's Handmaiden', 'Mr Creepy', yes, I know the names people gave him. Most childish. How did that happen?"

"An unlikely series of events."

No doubt. She wasn't going to tell me any more than that. Like Rebecca, I had started at Genomex in 1992, and had never known Eckhart before Adam tried to kill him, yes, Paul told me about that. Paul knew perfectly well that Adam had done his best to kill Mason Eckhart. He was disappointed in his flawed creation, but he was convinced he needed Adam's help, so the incident was never handled legally.

Paul threw his creativity and energy into keeping Eckhart alive, a way of undoing Adam's attempt at murder, and of keeping Eckhart's good will. Paul worried that Eckhart would decide to sue Genomex and open the company and all of its projects to public scrutiny, something he considered disastrous at the time.

Eckhart was kept sedated, and required huge doses of painkillers to cope with his failing body and Paul's treatments. During his lucid moments, he made clear to Paul that he wanted a financial settlement, not a legal war. He would never know how relieved Paul was to hear that.

I liked Rebecca. She was about as good as humans could be. She was rational. In the years we had been 'neighbors' at Genomex, she kept everyone at a distance. Adam was not the only one. Driving Adam away I could understand, but the others? Maybe she didn't even know she was doing it. I remembered Eckhart as one of the oddest humans I ever met, and humans could be so very peculiar. I had never discerned much humanity in Eckhart. Paul described to me how different he had been before the murder attempt and when Eckhart still had a family. Paul's description was difficult to reconcile with the man I knew.

Putting Eckhart and Steyn together was not a puzzle easily solved.

"Rebecca, I know Eckhart had Paul murdered."

Rebecca was unmoved. That surprised me. She knows. Eckhart told her about the murder. That is an act of profound trust. I would not expect that of him. She just told me more than she realizes. What else does she know?

"There are all kinds of stories about Mason, some quite absurd, some he created and spread himself. Sorting them out is a challenge for anyone who does not know Mason." Rebecca spoke without much emotion.

True enough! But I already knew the truth.

"Frank Thorne talked before he died."

Indeed, he had, but Rebecca showed no flicker of recognition of the name.

"The name means nothing to me."

"Thorne worked for Mason," I informed.

"A lot of people have worked for Mason."

Dozens, hundreds of people had worked for Eckhart. Quite possibly Eckhart told her the unadorned, perfect truth of the murder without mentioning the name of the killer.

"Aren't you just a little shocked by what I've said, at your Mason's involvement in the death of the man who hired you on at Genomex?"

"Not really. Mason's…done a lot of things. If I ask him about it, he will tell me."

Rebecca had the reputation at Genomex for being, well, rather staid. Some people told stories about their drinking and drug adventures while in college, but not Rebecca. She didn't condemn anyone who had done these things, but clearly she found such conduct needless risk-taking. The cool way she talked about the sins of Mason Eckhart surprised me. I had considered the possibility that she was naively unaware of his nature, but no. I would guess now that Eckhart shared all the secrets of his dark heart with her.

"And you can accept that?"

"As I once told someone else, Mason is at once the best man and the worst man I have ever known."

"You're a complicated surprise."

"Many of us are." She smiled faintly.

I laughed. How very true! "No wonder you couldn't stand Adam! I like to keep him off balance. I honestly am not sure what I will do with you. Having you here makes such good sport with Adam."

"I hoped I would not have to look at him very much. I have a question for you. What are you trying to do?"

She had been very direct in our days at Genomex, but not under such stress. If she was bold enough to ask, I decided she deserved an answer.

"Breedlove created Adam to satisfy his own curiosity and to prove it could be done. He then shifted his attention back to altering human genetics. He designed Adam –and me—to watch over the Genomex mutants. When Adam returned from Stanford, Breedlove reprogrammed him to that goal. Our purpose was to guarantee the survival and multiplication of the Genomex mutants."

Catherine squirmed. Is it true then, Adam's story that Eckhart was father to a Genomex mutant himself?

"Are there more of you? If there is an Adam, and a Lilith, shouldn't there also be an Eve, and others?"

Rebecca's question took me by surprise. Of course. Paul must not have stopped with me. There must be an Eve, constructed somewhere within Genomex while I was away at school. But where was Even now?

"I never considered such a possibility. But you are most likely correct. That's Paul's kind of thinking."

"Lili, why do you serve the interests of the Genomex mutants? What benefits are there for you?"

"Benefits for us? None."

"The Genomex mutants eventually will bring about the extinction of the human race. How can you proceed, knowing that?"

"I concede your projection of extinction. I understood that years ago, and re-programmed myself, eliminating Paul's original direction for me. I never had the heart to tell Paul what I had done. Now, I need a chance to re-program Adam, who will be a more difficult subject since he is literally hard-wired. Compared to me, his programming and processing are primitive. Maybe that's why Adam's interpretation of taking care of the Genomex mutants can be whimsical and self-serving."

" 'Eve' and the others will likely take your place."

"If 'she' is not already acting to achieve the same goal. Surely by now your Mason has noted there are more 'Genomex' mutants than can be accounted for in the Genomex records."

"He has. Tracking them back to their source has proven…difficult."

"The other centers were small and did no research. All research came out of Genomex, and was applied in clinics leased for short periods of time to a myriad of corporate illusions, an entirely different model than the organization of Genomex. Documentation was sloppy and erratic. There never was a master list compiling names, parents, and details about mutants created in the satellite centers."

"I am curious to know whether Dr Breedlove maintained contact with former colleagues from the old country, the ones who took up residence in more southerly locations."

"I am surprised you know about that. Some secrets Paul kept even from me. I think he believed I knew nothing about his life in Europe, or the name he was first given. Paul thought he had hidden his past completely. You are well-informed."

"The irony of Paul's association with the Nazis is that he never believed their silly racial theories. Look at me: I'm no blonde uberwoman, but the fusion of the best qualities of many individuals no matter what their racial origin. That's what Paul really believed. Now, to return to your question about associates from the old country, yes, he kept contact with them, chiefly to siphon money from them in return for techniques and technology. The old Nazis, and their progeny, the new Nazis, remained fixated on the Nordic Uberman, and because they have concerned themselves so much with superficial traits, they have been about as successful as the Lebensborn Project."

Had I told her too much? No. Only a handful of people on earth would know better than to dismiss my story as lurid fantasy.

"So Paul Breedlove never believed in Nazi ideology?"

"Of course not. Paul was a sophisticated, educated man who thought in terms of the genius of humanity. He found the notion of a 'master race' laughable."

"Yet he worked with and for monsters. He stood at that infamous railroad siding and watched while people were chosen to live and to die. Why didn't he find a way to get out of Germany? My distant Steyn cousins, the ones who were able to get out, scattered all over the earth, even as far as Shanghai. They went wherever they could."

"By the end of the war, Paul was still legally a child. As a child, what could he have done?"

Rebecca shrugged. "I did not realize he was so young."

"Paul carried a burden of guilt from those days. He once hoped the Genomex projects would produce medical advancements for mankind, a counterbalance to what he had done earlier."

"That didn't happen."

"No."

"Genomex yielded horrors of its own."

"Unfortunately, yes."

"Mason had years of opportunity to search every cubic centimeter of Genomex…not just the obvious places, but down several levels, too, into the secret spaces, sealed against discovery. The secrets of Genomex burrow down into the earth, descending towards Hell. Mason doesn't understand the science, but he knows most everything there is to be found in the sublevels. Now, so do I."

"Paul was not a perfect man. He was well aware of his imperfections. But like your Mason, he was not a monster; I loved him very much. I miss him and still wish we were together."

"Nothing is ever simple, is it?"

"Never."

"This place looks like every description I've heard of Sanctuary, but it's not Sanctuary, is it? Sanctuary is flooded."

"It is. This is Haven. Breedlove programmed Adam and me with plans for identical hideaways."

Rebecca pointed towards the ceiling. "If I start thinking about the tons of rock above my head, I'll panic."

"Haven is safer than it looks. Unlike Sanctuary, there are no underground rivers above us to flood these chambers. I have always been more detail-driven than Adam. Much of Haven is built within a naturally occurring cavern that has remained stable for millions of years. Geologically, we are located in an unusually stable area not prone to earthquakes. Before locating Haven, I examined possible sites for six years. I had a team of geologists working for me full time. You are far safer here than you would have been in Sanctuary. The work I am doing here is far too important to risk in an unsafe location." I stopped to chuckle. "He may have been joking, but Adam told me a few days ago that he selected Sanctuary's location because he liked the view from the top of Stormking Mountain."

"And what are you doing here?"

"Facilitating the next evolutionary stage of humanity by perfecting ectogenesis. Humanity, not mutantkind."

Mason

Years ago, when I first prowled the sublevels of Genomex, one fear nagged at me, and that was the dread of falling or becoming injured, and not being found.

I had fewer security people in those years and they were thinly spread. This was before the time of badges with transponders. I could easily have died deep below Genomex. After all, I did not tell anyone what I was doing, and there was no one to miss me.

No one to miss me.

Well, with Rebecca's 'camping out' at Laura Varady's who would miss me now?

No one.

I had largely abandoned those solitary late-night subterranean expeditions. Rebecca and I had opened nearly all of the remaining sealed labs. We knew additional labs existed, but we had not found them yet. They were hidden somewhere. Surviving documentation and contemporary description of the laboratories in the sublevels was sometimes detailed, sometimes almost nonexistent, with only a reference to "Lab 37" that could not be accounted for. Using ground radar and metal detectors, everything would eventually be found.

I would be glad when there were no more horrors to be found. I had seen enough.

Opening a lab sealed off since 1983 or 1988 was peculiar business. Electrical service was never cut to these rooms, but the ductwork was sealed. Upon opening, a sealed lab could present a pristine appearance, but a handful showed extensive water or insect damage.

In rare cases, labs had been evacuated in a great hurry, time taken only to block the drains and ventilation. Desks sat waiting for researchers who would never return, pens, pencils, calendars, everything left as it had been 30 or more years before.

The pitiful creatures who (and they were all part human) prompted such sealings had been put to death, typically at an early stage of development. Their hybrid forms told the tale of their origins, usually humans and vertebrates, but there were others: humans combined with arthropods or insects, and a small number arising from the mixture of humans and green plants.

The last group was the oddest. I found one perfectly preserved 'little boy' who looked to be about five years old. His skin was still dark green, as was his hair. His skin puzzled me until I looked very closely and realized the roughened appearance was due to the covering of tiny leaves.

I could not discern whether he died naturally or if he had been murdered, but I will never forget he sight of him. What did he think about? Did the fact of his mixed metabolism—because those leaves, small and present in such profusion, had to be taking in carbon dioxide—affect his thinking and outlook? Or had he been too young to understand?

Voluminous laboratory records had been neatly stored in the same lab. I had them removed to the 'family' room where we could examine them in relative comfort with good lighting. Rebecca and I spent several evenings going through this documentation.

Nearly all of the material proved to be tedious descriptions of the preparation of buffer solutions and the like. However, with persistence we learned more about the chlorophyll boy. We read the interesting parts to one another.

"Thyme. He's covered with tiny thyme leaves, Mason." For purposes of experimentation it had not mattered what kind of plant was used, so the leaves of Thymus praecox, 'Elfin' creeping thyme had been used.

Buried deeply among more mundane matters, I found an extraordinary memo from Adam to the hum/green plant group:

"I have been informed that several 'cuttings' have been taken from the leafy epidermis of our successful human/green plant fusion subject, exposed to rooting hormone, and grown as a plant. This would be an interesting tangential study, but these cuttings have not been grown within the bounds of the workgroup but in private homes. All such rooted, growing plants must be brought to my lab for destruction. The leafy epidermis is NOT a pure plant but contains detectable human DNA. The possibility of a plant grown from the leafy epidermis being analyzed and found to contain human DNA is not acceptable."

"Who knows if all of the rooted 'plants' were returned?"

"Someone could have ground cover thyme growing underfoot and have no idea that what they walk on…is partly human."

The green leaf-skinned chlorophyll boy was found late in 2009, when Adam awaited trial for embezzlement. Chlorophyll Boy haunted me and haunted Rebecca. I arranged a meeting with Adam.

His orange jump suit did not enhance his dignity, but he agreed to the meeting, not knowing what we wanted of him. He must have been very curious.

"We're not here about the trial, Adam. We're here about another matter recently come to light."

I carried a folder containing four color photographs of Chlorophyll Boy. I spread them out before Adam. He recognized the boy. I have no doubt of that. He picked up one of the photos and studied it carefully.

"What's this about, Mason?"

"That's what I came to hear you tell me."

"We tried a lot of unusual things in the early 1980s. A human who was part green plant, capable of taking up carbon dioxide, would be suited for prolonged space flight. Crew members who could scrub CO2 from the air as well as perform their other duties would be particularly valuable."

"What happened?" Rebecca asked.

"Jason turned out to be less than stable emotionally."

"Jason's his name?"

"Jason Verdeschi."

"An emotionally unstable Genomex mutant. How unique, Adam." Didn't Adam ever learn anything? Most Genomex mutants were unstable emotionally.

"I don't have to sit and listen to this, especially from you." He glared, as if that would work on me. He was the one in the orange jump suit. I was the one who would walk out freely.

"How did he die, Adam? He was a perfectly preserved desiccated little mummy when we found him. At first I thought he was a miniature old man, until I looked at his face." Rebecca had a lot of control.

"We freeze-dried him. He was developing normally, and then, we couldn't control him. We tried a lot of drugs. They didn't work. The governors we had then were crude and could not be used on such young children."

Did you spray him with Roundup, Adam?

"And because of that, you…?" I asked.

"I honestly don't remember. That was thirty years ago, and there were so many of them who did not survive into adulthood."

"How many other chlorophyll children?"

"I don't recall. I do recall they were difficult to create. For each one who lived to be born, dozens were spontaneously aborted."

"Where are the others? The others who lived?"

"Incinerated. Jason was nearly perfect, the most promising."

That's all any of them were to you, promising or not so promising projects. They weren't people to you.

"What about his family?"

"He didn't have one. His parents were in an automobile accident. He was delivered by Caesarian two months premature not long before his mother died. The Breedlove Foundation was listed as next-of-kin. That's how he came to Genomex."

But despite recalling all of that, you cannot recall what happened to Jason. Very credible, Adam.

The interview ended shortly after that. Adam played the victim, swearing once more that his ideas and processes had been stolen from him and applied perversely. There was little more to know of the short life of Jason the chlorophyll boy.

Adam pushed away from the table.

"We've heard that pathetic bleat before, Adam. It's never been convincing."

S0, here I was, years later, digging around in one of the strangest holes to ever be dug in the ground anywhere, all by myself in the middle of the night, wondering if Rebecca was ever coming back to me. There might not be anyone to miss me now, but when I made these descents, security prompted me once an hour to confirm I was not in trouble. With the transponder, they could come directly to me, with no need for a search.

Lilith

I was not pleased with the way Adam had overstepped the instructions given him, bringing Rebecca Steyn and Catherine Eckhart to Haven. I was glad to have Rebecca to talk to; she and her friend Samihah always treated me with respect at Genomex. Adam could be tiresome company. Learning her surprising connection to Eckhart was a shocker, however, as was the revelation of the young woman Catherine.

Paul had never told me anything about a mutant living at Genomex having a child by Eckhart. How could he not have known?

I hated very few things and fewer people. For having Paul murdered, Mason Eckhart was one of them. But to get revenge upon him by bringing harm to the wife or daughter, or both, seemed primitive, and so human. Adam's imperfections were made clear by his thinking in those terms.

Adam resented both of them. He put no effort into hiding this. He wanted the approval and adoration of both, but they both knew him too well.

What was I going to do with them? I could not simply charge Kurt or Matt with releasing them on a city street corner.

What I would like to do with Rebecca…is recruit her. Yes, she was a human. Might money be enough, not desired out of greed, but to fulfill some extraordinary dream? I needed to know more, and alas, Adam was my sole information source.

I found Adam tinkering with yet another pile of junk. He wasted a good deal of time this way.

"I'm sure this is not a social stop, Lilith. How may I help you?"

"Rebecca. I want to know the nature of her attachment to Eckhart."

"What do you mean?" He looked up from the electronic debris.

Rebecca remains a charged issue.

"The Eckhart I knew was not the kind of personality people wanted around. People avoided his company."

"With good reason."

"I don't recall Rebecca being sociable, either, but in a different way. People liked her, respected her. Nobody hesitated to ask her a question or borrow equipment from her. But, except for Samihah Shah after she became widowed, Rebecca appeared quite isolated. Men seemed to like her, but she kept her distance. Didn't she date anyone?"

"She dated Rob Abelmann for a while," Adam mumbled.

"Ah. Rob. Brilliant man. And one of your technical rivals. I can see that happening."

"Rob was squeamish. Once he saw how the mutant children began to develop in puberty, he wanted to intervene, to lessen the effects and when Paul refused, Rob became guilt ridden and ineffective. After his marriage fell apart in the late 1980s, his work deteriorated as well."

"Paul told me how good he had once been. How does Rebecca fit into this? I am not collecting ancient gossip, Adam; my questions have a serious purpose."

"The gossip of the day said they were all but living together. People expected them to marry."

"What happened?"

Adam shrugged. "Nothing dramatic. I never saw hostility from either of them, nothing indicating betrayal or deceit. Consensus opinion was that Rob was still interested, but that she preferred her own company."

"And what about you?" I intended the question as an ambush.

"We had lunch once."

He was mumbling again, but I caught all of the words anyway.

"You didn't ask her again?"

"She always had something else to do."

Who could blame her?

Rebecca had time for Adam's professional rival and time for Eckhart, but no time for Adam, Prince of Genomex! No wonder the prince is still smarting.

"What is she doing with your former friend Mason?"

Of course I knew about Adam's tacky affair with Mason's first wife. Paul told me everything. But Adam did not need to know that I knew.

Adam was deeply annoyed by my question. I'm sure he found Eckhart's survival annoying 22 years after Adam inflicted devastating damage that should have killed him within days.

"Boy-girl things, Adam. Can your former friend do boy-girl things? Or are these two up to something else?"

"Before Mason purged Genomex in late 2007, I had several people inside, working for me."

Spies? I should not be surprised.

"You did?" I asked, trying to sound impressed.

"Yes, Lilith. As much as possible, they kept me informed of current projects and their status."

"And?"

"The technical people were good about keeping up with projects, but they had no idea what was going on. They couldn't tell me anything. I managed to get people through the back door by getting them hired on the kitchen staff, and when they told me they were providing meals –real food—to Eckhart's wife Rebecca Steyn, I was stunned."

"You are not much help to me, Adam."

Rebecca

"What now?" Catherine asked, stretching out on the futon.

She was a gutsy young woman, but she was scared. So was I.

"Well, we're definitely not guests, no matter what Lili says. Let's play along with the pretense of being guests for a while longer. There is no reason to be overtly hostile…yet."

"How well do you know this woman?"

"Not at all. She had a lab across from mine in the early 1990s. I was pleasant to her, that's all."

"What was that about Paul Breedlove?"

"I know Mason's told you he committed murder to keep the public unaware of the existence of Genomex mutants."

"Yeah."

"In 2007, Breedlove planned to release a statement and a book. Someone else did the actual killing, but at Mason's command. That must have been this Frank Thorne. Breedlove must have known the public was likely to panic, but he was guilt-ridden. Mason did try to talk him out of the release, Catherine."

"That's okay. I understand why he did it. I know all about the way people react to Genomex mutants when they don't understand them."

I looked around the room. Piles of electronic junk were everywhere.

"He does have some nice computers, though. I'll see if he's silly enough to have a line out without encrypted access." Catherine got up, switched on the nearest monitor, and smiled. Whatever he had worked on last was all over the screen. "I'll bet we could learn some interesting things." She looked up hopefully at the air duct. "In the movies, prisoners always escape through ventilation ducts." Catherine looked up hopefully at the air vent, which was unusually large but would still require a person to drag themself through.

"I'm claustrophobic. The ductwork would have to be large enough for me to walk through. I don't even do well in elevators."

I didn't do well with heights, either. Or places deep underground.

"We'll find a way. Maybe we could annoy Adam enough so that he would throw us out." Catherine smirked. "Between the two of us, we could annoy Adam a lot."

"I'm sure we could make Adam miserable…but I'm not sure we want to do that, trapped down here with him. Antagonizing Adam is probably unwise."

"Too bad," Catherine said. "Annoying Adam would have been fun."

"For every ingress, there is an egress," I said.

"Who said that?"

"Cinnabar, the one o'clock fox."

Catherine looked puzzled.

"A children's book I read a long time ago."

"Oh."

Lilith

I was curious about Catherine. Adam told me several contradictory things about her, and I decided the only way to the truth was to find it myself.

"Okay. I'm here. What do you want?"

She wasn't whining. She was being very direct.

"I find I cannot trust or believe the things Adam tells me about people. So, I thought if I was going to learn about you, I would ask you."

"Oh."

"You're very quiet, Catherine. Have you so little to say?"

"I'm not a scientist like you or Rebecca. I don't even know the right questions to ask."

I studied Catherine's face, searching in vain for some suggestion of her father. I found none. Adam and Mason both believed she was Mason's progeny. But how unlike him in looks.

I watched her eyes. She studied me carefully, the way I'd seen Mason observe people. She either learned that from him…or had it encoded.

"You think a lot of Rebecca, don't you?"

"She's been good to me. That's why I introduce her to people as my not-evil stepmother."

I smiled at that. Rebecca always did tend to take in the lost souls.

"Rebecca was nice to me when I worked at Genomex. She didn't need to be, but she was."

"That's how she is. Rebecca hasn't hurt you. You don't even know me. Why do you keep us here?" She looked annoyed.

"Adam's miscalculation of my reaction made things very complicated. Adam thought I would enjoy harming the two of you to hurt Mason, but Adam is a barbarian. You do know Mason has done some dreadful things, don't you?"

"He's probably told me everything important. I've never caught Mason lying to me. Anything I ask him, he tells me."

She did not have Mason's forbidding exterior, but Catherine had that icy pragmatism.

"You knew Mason had Paul Breedlove murdered?"

"By a telekinetic who worked for him in those days."

"I witnessed that killing. Did he tell you that?"

"He must not know."

"I doubt he does. It's been so long now, it does not matter. Adam mistakenly believed I would hurt you and Rebecca to hurt your father. Mason Eckhart is not one of my favorite people but I am not like Adam, and I do not think like him. So, murder doesn't bother you?"

"I am a Genomex mutant. I know how most people look upon anyone different or 'strange'. There would have been panic if Breedlove had gone to the press. People would have been killed on suspicion of being a mutant."

"I agree with you. I tried to talk Paul out of a public statement. The last conversation we had was about that very subject. Unfortunately, Paul's guilt clouded his judgment, and he remained adamant about releasing the statement and the book."

"Breedlove created a lot of unhappiness. I know that from watching my mother."

"I won't defend the creation of the Genomex mutants. Making them at all was a mistake, and making thousands of them was catastrophic."

"But you've got Adam here with you."

Catherine really disliked Adam.

"And what has Adam done to you?" Adam barely mentioned Catherine, but clearly he loomed large in her thoughts.

"Oh, Adam…used me to steal for him…and misled my mother. She always expected Adam to show up any moment, and rescue us. Of course, he never did, and never intended to."

"You sound bitter."

"I grew up thinking Adam was my father." My mother talked about Adam all the time, so I thought he must be my father.

"Your mother never told you otherwise?"

"No."

"Understandable, perhaps. Having Mason Eckhart for a father would have been awkward at best for a mutant living covertly."

"The possibility never occurred to me. In those days, among mutants, Mason Eckhart was regarded as an inhuman arch-fiend."

"I imagine not. Before Eckhart emerged a changed man from stasis, and drastically altered procedures and policies towards mutants, nearly every mutant alive perceived him as an inhuman monster, an impression Eckhart encouraged."

It just isn't true that Mason hates these people. That's just another of Adam's confabulations. From all reports, Mason adores Catherine, and she adores him fiercely.

"Some strange things happen to us all, Catherine."

"Did you know Rebecca is pregnant?"

"No." She looked stunned by that. I wondered if Rebecca knew.

"She is. Possibly she may not know for certain, but my diagnostics leave no doubt. I was surprised."

"I'm not."

"No?"

"She's lost others."

"Mason's?"

"Of course."

Still waters, and all that. I hope you deserve these fiercely brave, fiercely loyal women, Mason Eckhart. Catherine seemed more amazed than offended I should ask such a question.

"How do you feel about that, Catherine?"

"I don't want Rebecca to suffer any more loss. She's lost enough. Please don't say anything to her. Perhaps this will end like the last one, but this time she won't have to know."

"Wouldn't you worry that a new sibling might displace affection Mason holds for you?"

"No. He went to great lengths to win my affection, with three other living children."

"I'm sorry. I did not mean to be rude."

"Baloney, Dr Chen. I may be your prisoner here, but we're not unthinking people."

"No. Indeed you are not."

The world is full of unthinking people reacting without thought or reflection. I had erred in believing that this was in any fashion an ordinary family group. I have an unfortunate tendency to underestimate humans.

"How do you feel about being a Genomex mutant, Catherine?"

She did not hesitate to reply. "I resent Paul Breedlove for tampering with my mother and making her a stealth. She endured a lot because of the rarity of her mutation, and her health was never robust."

I was taken aback by the directness of her reply. Fully under my control, she spoke her mind freely, exactly as Mason would have done.

"He meant well," I offered.

"The road to Hell…"

She was right. Her eyes blazed with anger.

"I'm sorry."

"For me, being a Genomex mutant means more than a misguided research project. It implies an early death and makes unwise my ever having children. And for some people, my being a stealth makes me suspect every time something goes missing or things are altered without apparent explanation."

She sounded bitter. I should not have been surprised by her resentment. I should have been able to predict it.

Rebecca

Fortunately, Lilith did not keep us confined to Adam's room. With Adam and Lilith absorbed in some unnamed and undescribed technical work, we were free to wander about the unsecured spaces of Haven. We decided to 'go for a walk' daily, which meant making laps around the outer perimeter of the main Haven space, until we became completely bored with walking in circles.

No wonder racehorses get track sour.

As our circuit brought us by the koi pond and the noise of the waterfall, we stopped and changed the subject of our conversation.

"We have to get out of here. We cannot hope that Mason will somehow be able to find us. Even if he knew we were here, this place is a fortress. No one gets in here casually."

"Maybe Lilith will get bored with us," Catherine suggested.

"I think Lilith won't care if she's bored with us. I think she wishes we had never showed up, because now we know she's hiding Adam and helped him get out of prison. We could put her in prison under the proper circumstances. We had no idea where she was before, and even after flying here, I don't know where this place is. Do you?"

"I'm afraid not. Every time I've had an excuse to be in the kitchen, I've looked at everything to try to find a regional product, but everything is nationally distributed and available everywhere. Lilith's secret hideaway may be safer than she thinks."

"I wonder if we could convince her of that?" Rebecca mused.

"Worth a try. What do you make of her 'troops'?"

"They certainly are…healthy looking."

"I don't think they're mutants. I have not seen them do anything unusual. I think they might be what she is," Catherine said.

"But when did Lilith have time to create them? She hasn't been independent of Genomex long enough to have raised them."

"Can they be human, just carefully recruited?"

"I don't know. They share a similarity of height, build, and coloring. I'm certain they are related."

"I've seen them reading books." Catherine seemed surprised.

"What were they reading?"

"I couldn't see the titles, but whatever they had, they were intense about it."

"I don't think they're stupid. I suspect instead they are very smart."

Catherine laughed. "Well, they do ignore Adam. Have you noticed?"

I smiled. "They appear devoted to Lili. They either have good taste or good judgment. But I've seen only three of them: John, Kurt, and Matthew. Perhaps with the right distraction…"

"Something to think about."

"I wish we knew approximately where we are. If we got outside only to find ourselves in a forsaken wilderness, escape would be meaningless."

"What was Adam thinking when he brought us here?"

"He wasn't. For all his intellect, Adam remains highly emotional. He's thinking only about revenge. Lilith can handle him. My only real dread is that Jesse might show up, and make peace with Adam."

"Poor Jesse," Catherine sighed.

"If you had seen him, you wouldn't say that. He's become someone that none of us know anymore. Or would want to know."

"I liked the old Jesse."

"So did I. But everything has changed."

Rebecca

I knew things about Mason that probably no one else still alive knew, not Laura Varady, not even Miss Vermont. They weren't sleazy, forbidden things, just the details that added up to each individual.

I knew that he preferred Orangesicles to Fudgesicles; that his favorite color –yes, he had a favorite color! – was a deep royal blue, and that that was the color he liked best for me to wear; that his favorite horror writer was H P Lovecraft; and that his favorite movie was 'The Manchurian Candidate'.

None of these were critical matters. One could work with him for years and learn not one of them, since he habitually revealed little of himself. The importance of these things arose from the fact he shared them with me, and that I remembered them. Few people in his life troubled to learn much about him. Mason worked hard and gave his best without being urged or even asked. Most people came to expect this without ever wondering about his motivations.

No doubt many of my memories would surprise some people who thought they knew him.

One Saturday afternoon in August, rain fell all day. No thunderstorms, just rain.

We had not spoken in hours, intent upon our reading. We could do that and be comfortable, not requiring a constant flow of conversation.

"I have an idea."

"Thinking is a dangerous habit, Rebecca."

"We should go up on the roof."

"It's raining."

"Exactly. You'll see."

Standing just inside the stairwell door to the roof, I turned to him and asked, "How long has it been since you felt the rain on your face?'

"Years. At least twenty."

"Peel the faux skin off your face."

Mason didn't hesitate. He just smiled, removed his glasses and stripped the 'skin' away.

He stepped outside into the rain. The day was comfortably warm. For many moments, Mason stood without a word, eyes closed, face uplifted, absorbing the sensation of rain.

We take so much for granted. Being with Mason taught me to take nothing for granted.

One February afternoon, snow began falling heavily. We weren't used to heavy snowfall. Darkness fell, and the snow continued to deepen, despite predictions. Then the wind came, driving the snow into drifts.

Mason stood by the window, pondering the surreal snowscape.

"No one will come to work tomorrow."

"Hah! The way these people panic at the sight of White Death, you'll be lucky to see half the staff here by 10 AM. Two days from now."

"Pity I cannot compel them to make up time lost to snow the way schools do."

He was only half-joking. He expected a great deal from his people.

"Let none make moan," I said, quoting from an obscure poem.

"From what I can see, this is a wet, heavy snow. Do you know what that means?"

"No."

"It will pack down nicely into snowballs. We should not waste this opportunity."

That's how we ended up outside, wind blowing snow sideways. The site was deserted by late afternoon except for the GSA people with the ill luck to have drawn this shift. No doubt the teams monitoring the badges and exterior cameras were astonished at what their sensors told them, but I doubt they could see much of Mason and me chasing each other through snowdrifts, throwing snowballs.

"We're going to be the talk of the next security shift change meeting, whenever another shift can get here."

"No one will believe a word of it!"

I have no idea how long we were out there, but I was exhausted when we came back inside.

Mason officially closed the facility the following day, and we slept in very late. He didn't get to his office until 11.30.

Mason

People little appreciate or understand the comfort to be found in ordinary events. Some spend their lives in the search of the exotic and arcane, never realizing how important the mundane and routine is to them.

I understood. From the time Marcus drowned, I think I understood. With Marcus gone, everything changed, all the familiar details my life wove around. Mom withdrew. Dad hardly spoke to either of us. I hid in my room.

Just a few years later, even that chilly home was lost to me.

I wanted my home back, save that I wanted it back better than I had known it. For a handful of years in the 1980s, I actually had what I so desperately desired: a home, a family, a place in life where I was needed and belonged. I believed at the time I was loved as well, but with hindsight and the passage of time I honestly am no longer certain what Jackie thought of me.

I had it all worked out in my head: Sometime about 1992, at the latest, I was going to find another job at a place that wasn't dirty like Genomex. No more children with haunted eyes. No more Paul Breedlove with his unholy dreams of altering humanity. No, the five of us, we'd leave the tainted world of Genomex behind and never look back.

Jackie shattered that plan with her affair with Adam, and the divorce that followed. Shortly after, Adam made sure I was tied to Genomex forever.

All the trivial details of my daily life with my family were lost to me. Possibly they meant far more to me than they did to people accustomed to such circumstances.

I lost myself in an emotional wilderness for more than a decade. The routines of replacing the biopolymer at least once a day, of uncounted injections, multiple transfusions, did not replace the ordinary, comforting routines that I lost.

I climbed out of that deep hole slowly, over a period of years.

I never expected to see anything but the bottom of that emotional pit…except that I had. I had recovered my children, established friendships, and somehow, won Rebecca.

And now, all of that might be lost. Even Catherine was unreachable. Always reliable about responding to email or messages, I now heard nothing and was becoming concerned.

I cautiously sipped my pink slurry. Lately, everything was making me very sick. Simultaneously, I craved nourishment, and dreaded ingesting it. Very soon now, I would require intravenous feeding to stay alive. I could not keep enough pink slurry down to maintain my weight.

Nausea washed over me. I broke out into a sweat under the biopolymer. I closed my eyes, gripped the arms of my chair, and waited for the moment to pass. And waited. Finally, I put my head down on the table, realizing finally that I was descending into a health crisis and I could no longer ignore what was happening. Summoning the remnants of strength and the ability to concentrate, I reached into a pocket and activated what amounted to a 'panic button', setting in motion all kinds of consequences.

The men watching outside the door, ordinarily forbidden entry to the 'family' room, came charging in, weapons drawn. By then, I was barely conscious. I cannot remember who they were, but I do remember them saying something about the infirmary.

I'm not sure how they got me there. They may have carried me the whole way, or they may have used the food cart to transport me. I'm not sure.

Dr Prodana was automatically paged. I cannot know how long it was before she appeared, but I do not think it was long.

"Why didn't you call before this?" she barked at me. "You look like hell. You never look very good, but now you look terrible."

"Came on suddenly."

Rebecca should have been automatically paged as well.

"Where is Rebecca?" I asked.

"We're trying to find her."

"Find her?"

"She hasn't been at work, and she hasn't been at Laura's. Nobody's seen her since Tuesday morning, right before lunch."

"Why wasn't I told, and why wasn't anything done before this?"

"I was told that her group was concerned yesterday, and that Dr Nanavaty got on the phone and spent three hours tracking down Dr Varady. Laura Varady said she was coming back here to talk to you, had packed her things at Varady's, and didn't say anything about going anywhere else."

"Have the police been called?"

"The police are in fact on their way here. Dr Nanavaty called them when she couldn't reach you this morning."

"I must have passed out. Has the GSA shift captain been informed?"

The police will think I've done something to her.

"Mr Delay is in my office, waiting for you after I've done an examination."

Rowland Delay always looked like a nervous rodent with an upset stomach. He had escaped the staff purge in 2007 by being temporarily assigned to Washington. I don't think he much cared for me. Perhaps he was grouchy with everyone. No matter; he was thorough and he paid attention to fine detail.

"This won't wait."

Prodana said nothing, but threw her hands in the air, shook her head, and went for Delay. She knew better than to argue with me.

"Mr Delay, has anyone spoke to you about Dr Steyn's disappearance?"

Dr Prodana stood out of the way, by the wall. I saw her roll her eyes when I referred to Rebecca as 'Dr Steyn'. Delay of course knew we were married, I naturally knew that he knew…old habits die hard.

"Dr Nanavaty called me this morning after she finally found Dr Varady about 10.45. I extracted Dr Steyn's keycard log. Tuesday she logged out of the building at 12.03 PM and left the parking lot at 12.06. That's the last the keycard system has of her."

"Prepare a validated copy of the log for the police. Talk to her work group and find out who she talked to that morning. I have no idea where she might have gone."

I wish I did.

Delay turned to leave.

"No, wait, put out an announcement to the entire facility, asking anyone who talked to her that morning to come forward. You and the police can talk to them at the same time; that's efficient."

He hesitated before speaking. "They're going to want to talk to you, sir."

"Of course. The spouse is always a suspect. Bring them here. I'll be able to give them her brother's phone numbers and anything else they want."

Delay looked stunned for a moment. "I'll go make that announcement."

Lilith

Adam's shopping expeditions typically ended with Adam depositing purchases all over Haven, leaving everything sitting out, leaving my sons the task of putting things away.

They were annoyed by this, of course, but getting Adam to change would take a lot of work.

I could hear Adam's voice back in my lab. He was speaking much louder than usual, although sorting out individual words was impossible. Listening closely, I sorted out an unfamiliar male voice. Adam had dragged home another surprise.

On my way out of my lab to find out what Adam had dragged in this time, I met Kurt coming the other way.

"Adam's brought along one of his mutant followers from a few years back."

I did not stop to reply, but turned and opened the top drawer of the nearest file cabinet and tossed a palm-sized, smooth oval piece of metal into a lab coat pocket.

Whatever Adam might be up to, including taking over Haven, I intended to stop him immediately.

Adam and his companion had crossed nearly the length of Haven and were speaking to Rebecca and Catherine. I walked briskly to catch up with them.

"Look who I've brought with me."

Rebecca does not scare easily, but she looked frightened now.

"Nice to see you, Rebecca, Catherine."

"Adam, who is this?"

Adam turned to face me and smiled. I did not like that smile. "This is Jesse Kilmartin. He can walk through walls."

"And wrench the unborn from inside their mothers," Rebecca said softly.

I had no idea what Rebecca was talking about, but I was sure she believed what she said.

"Adam, why did you bring him here?"

"He needed a place to stay, and I thought he would be useful."

"He's a murderer, Lilith," Catherine said.

"My daughter was killed, so I destroyed Mason's grandson. Now, we're even."

"When the public finds out people like you and me exist, people like you are going to make us all look like menaces to society. If there's a bloodbath, you'll be part of the cause."

"That isn't fair, Catherine," Adam said.

"You're one of the last people in the world who should say anything about what is fair," I added.

"How would you know anything about what I lost, Catherine?" Jesse demanded.

"Because when I was facing the same circumstance, I decided the preservation of humanity was more important than my personal wishes. Jesse, you were selfish and wrong to want that daughter."

"Catherine, I don't think you're going to reason with him," Rebecca cautioned.

"Probably not. But someone needs to tell him he is less of a victim than he believes."

"What a world you've made, Adam." But I knew Adam would never claim ownership of this world.

"I didn't know what they were doing with my research."

I laughed. Adam never changed his pathetic bleat. Catherine stared at him in disbelief.

"Adam, Breedlove created my mother the way she was, so I can't blame you personally. But even in 1978, my mother was already showing signs of illness. What was in your mind when you made a thousand –or many thousands—more, as flawed as she was?"

"I was looking for cures."

Adam's lies never changed.

Lili startled me by laughing! "Adam, there are still a lot of people in this world who will believe that worn out story, but none of them are here."

Adam was furious. The fact that Lili continued to smile softly, mocking him, did not help.

"Adam, it was always about feeding your curiosity and your ego. The sight of your mistakes disturbed you, but not enough to make you stop making more mutants." Lili shook her head slowly. "One of the procedures all researchers follow is that if an experimental approach fails, one does not continue the very same thing dozens of times! One tries something else, or there will never be progress or improvement."

I had been thinking the same thing, but I was not sure of how rational Adam was. Making points against him might not be a good idea deep underground. I had never seen Adam this angry before.

Kurt moved to stand a few steps closer to Lili, a not so veiled move making clear his intention to defend her if Adam attacked.

"Adam, you tampered with these people before they were born, frequently when they existed merely as eggs. How could you save them before they manifested a problem?"

Lili had nailed him there. He looked trapped. Had he not been responsible for so much personal destruction, not only of the mutants he created, but of their families as well, I could have felt sorry for him. But I could not feel sorry for him; he was highly intelligent. Throughout his twenty years at Genomex, the company provided him with state of the art instrumentation and equipment, and recruited talented, creative people to assist him. Adam should have known better. Instead, he turned everything around and made himself the victim. There was something obscene about that.

"Lili, we're both Paul Breedlove's creations…"

"We have that in common, but I recognize the flaws in Paul's vision. You remain rooted in denial. Adam, Paul came to understand how wrong he was. Why can't you? If you weren't so emotional, you would conclude the same, and work to contain the tainted DNA."

"Do you think we're freaks, Dr Chen?" Jesse looked crazy.

"That's a cruel work for it, but yes, that's exactly what you are."

"You've been oddly quiet, Rebecca." Adam sounded like he was looking for a fight.

I thought of all the pain, grief, and loss Adam caused over the years, especially to Mason. Especially to Mason. I looked Adam squarely in the eyes. "Mason says you blight every life you touch."

Adam looked almost hurt when I said that.

Jesse's eyes had the same unhealthy glitter I'd seen just before he attacked Julie.

"And Mason's never harmed anyone?" Jesse challenged.

"Mason has never claimed to be blameless. He acknowledges what he has done. He takes responsibility for it."

Jesse drew himself up as tall as he could stand, and glowered at me. Lili saw it, too.

"Actions have consequences, Jesse." Lili said softly.

Jesse lunged towards Catherine and me over the pool. I'm not sure which of us he intended to attack, but in mid-path, he twisted his whole body about in pain and fell to the pond, partway in the water.

Lilith! Lilith was pointing a silvery metal object at him. The device fit neatly into her small right hand.

A governor? But Jesse was not implanted.

Adam rushed to Jesse, kneeling beside him. "What are you doing to him?" he demanded.

"Adam, you often give the impression no one else on earth but you can be inventive in matters involving Genomex mutants. Not so. Think back, Adam: Paul gave you the idea that you developed into several generations of subdermal governors. But after you left the company, Paul kept working on them."

She lightly tapped her head with her left forefinger. "All of Paul's technical notes and drawings are in here. From them, I constructed a vastly improved governor, one not requiring an implant. I'm going to release Jesse now, and hope he has learned something."

As soon as Lilith released the governor's hold on Jesse, he went limp onto the floor.

"He'll be fine as soon as the pain ceases. There won't be any permanent damage."

"Lili, could you do something to guarantee our safety in the company of someone who walks through walls?"

"If Jesse tries walking through my walls, he'll soon discover the price for such behavior. But I understand. Kurt, would you mind keeping watch on Dr Steyn and Ms Eckhart, just in case our latest guest becomes overly emotional?"

"No, ma'am, it would please me to do so."

Lilith handed the governor remote to Kurt, then turned to Catherine and me.

"Kurt knows how to use this controller. He will not accidentally inflict pain upon Catherine, although the device is effective upon every Genomex mutant. Ladies, unlike some, Kurt was raised to be a gentleman. I am confident you will feel secure under his protection."

Jesse remained curled up on the floor.

"Adam, when your friend can walk, please get him out of my sight." Lilith came and stood over Jesse. "Jesse, make trouble here in Haven, and I will throw you out into the cold world. Don't think I don't have ways of doing it. Adam, if you have any influence over your former follower, I suggest you use that influence to persuade him Haven is not the place to exercise his rage. Excuse me, but I have work waiting."

I turned to look at Kurt. He was blushing.

At first, I thought of Kurt as a kind of jailer. While I did like the way Jesse now kept his distance from us, we now had Kurt with us most every minute outside of time spent asleep, and even that was done with Kurt on an inflatable mattress placed against our door.

Kurt was, in fact, deeply curious about us. He was extremely bright, and for his apparent age, well-educated, well-educated and articulate. But he knew the world only from books, movies, and trips outside with Lili. He and his brothers had grown and developed too quickly—too noticeably—to consider enrolling them in schools.

I surprised myself one day by deciding I liked Kurt. He wasn't exactly shy or naïve, but he did not affect the jaded world weariness and boredom I found in so many of the young in their (vain) attempt to appear sophisticated and mature.

Kurt was curious about everything. Catherine and I took walks about Haven to stay fit, and Kurt was always with us. He enjoyed discussion and banter with new people. I realized something else, too: he was interested in Catherine, and that was not a good thing. I kept reminding myself that Kurt was more than a brilliant, educated young man. He was Lili's son.

What a pity. Clearly Catherine liked him back.

Kurt was somewhat the way I imagined Mason must have been once, based on the way Mason described his late youth before everything went s0 wrong for him: articulate, considerate, and quietly confident. Lili had done an impressive job raising him.

What if Mason had not been dealt so many damaging blows?

I knew the answer. He would have been another bright guy at Genomex, who probably would have thought I was quite peculiar, if there was ever any question raised at Genomex concerning me.

before one of them found what I had started to dread, images of Adam and unknown accomplices cornering the two women and taking them off, away from Rebecca's car.

Mason

Despite my worsening health, I pushed myself harder. By day's end, I wanted to fall asleep, not toss and turn while mulling over present miseries and possible things to do about them.

Since I now had evidence Genomex mutants formed some part of whatever Adam was doing, I successfully made the argument for the GSA's involvement. Rebecca would not approve, but she was not here to comment.

Almost every time I sent GS agents into the field when someone caught the scent of Adam and Lilith, I accompanied them. I had never been this single-minded about Adam before, but these forays distracted me from the symptoms of my body failing me so many different ways.

None of these agents could be described as friends. I knew their names and basic details about each of them, but if something happened to me in the wider world, I wasn't sure how some of them would react. I feared I them might be abandoned where I fell.

Dr Prodana weighed me three times daily, carefully tracking the trend of my weight. She adjusted the liquid I consumed to contain a good deal of fats and sufficient calories to keep weight on a lumberjack. I wasn't absorbing nutrients properly. The adjusted formula had a negligible effect upon my weight. I could not consume ordinary food at all without days of distress.

The newer class of antibiotics Prodana tried effectively kept infections at bay, but my usual (and already hardly normal) gut flora were displaced and overgrown with miserable side effects, requiring embarrassing adjustments to my routine.

I awoke exhausted every morning, never feeling rested. I forced myself to keep going, to always be at my desk no later than 6.45 AM, reviewing overnight communications. I took care that my physical dress and grooming did not deteriorate. Increasingly I was having memory problems with everything.

Nightmares about Marc drowning began again. I hadn't had those in years, but now I was reliving some permutation of that memory several nights a week.

If Marc had lived, how different would my life be now? Would my mother have chosen to stay on in this world? Would I not have been shipped off to school? Would Marc and I now be exchanging DVDs of our grandchildren's birthday parties, both of us working in industries having nothing to do with dark secrets and perversions of science, driven by 'black' projects with terrible secrets hidden several levels below the ground. We'd have family reunions…but Marc was gone, never knowing nine years. Just about everyone was gone, weren't they?

Maybe everything would have been different, but I'd never know.

I needed transfusions more often than Rebecca could provide. That meant blood from strangers, a necessity I had not worried about for years as I began making red and white blood cells. Now, the pitiful quantity of blood cells I produced was nowhere near enough.

Outside blood was screened before ever coming onto the site, and painstakingly re-screened by my own people. Nevertheless, infections became commonplace, and ever greater quantities of antibiotics were required. I began having difficulty keeping down the liquid diet.

I was miserable. I hurt all over, aching everywhere, but I did not dare show weakness, or allow anyone but Dr Prodana and a team of specialists to realize I had become so frail.

I began wondering if I was dying…this time. This time was different. My children were adults now, and they did not need me. Even worse, they did not want me. Grey would not return my phone calls. The speed of my descent towards oblivion was astonishing.

Dr Prodana was not Dr Breedlove. She could monitor my condition and fine-tune treatment daily, but she could not devise new or novel treatments. My stable of specialists was doing no better. They could detail to me exactly how my body was slowly failing me, but they weren't inventive enough to devise new, effective treatment. They wanted to put me on tranquilizers to calm me down. I did not want to be calm. I wanted to fight back.

One afternoon approaching two, I felt so weak and ill I cancelled the balance of the day's appointments and made my way back to our –my?— quarters. Just inside the inner door, I passed out. When I awoke, night had fallen, and I still felt ill.

I checked my messages. All were routine and expected. No one noticed that for several hours I had been incommunicado from this world, and that frightened me.

The episode of passing out for hours scared me enough to go to Dr Prodana first thing in the morning.

She was angry that I had not called the night before.

"Mr Eckhart, so many things are wrong with you that it is difficult to know how to sort out the factors that made you pass out. Have you ever considered taking a vacation to remove yourself from the stress of your job and to get some rest?

"How could I take a vacation? I cannot take my steel cave with me."

"No, but you could bolt the door and shut off Genomex contacts. Seriously, if you don't slow down and get rested, no treatment will help you."

"There isn't anyone to do what I do."

"If Godzilla came charging through here and flattened you with a single stomp, your supervisors in Washington would find someone else to take over. If they can find a suitable warm body, I'm certain you can find someone better."

She was correct. I just did not want to admit the truth of what Prodana said to her or to myself.

Lilith

"Lili, Kurt has been diligent and faithful in watching out for our safely, but Jesse presents a unique threat, especially to Catherine. Please set Catherine free. I've seen Jesse kill, and have no doubt that he's capable of killing again. Catherine is his most likely target."

"Why do you care? She's not your daughter," I said.

"That doesn't matter. I want Catherine safely away from Jesse."

For some time now, I had puzzled over how I would introduce this question to Rebecca, and now she handed me the opening.

"If I agree to Catherine's release, would you be willing to stay here and work with me for two years, if, in addition, I would do work to find a means to alleviate Mason's conditions or cure him completely?"

She was silent for a moment. Had she given up on her Mason ever being healthier?

"Do you think there is any possibility of that?"

"I don't think Genomex did any serious research along such lines after Adam left in 1998. A lot of changes and advances have come about in the last fifteen years."

"No doubt. If you would work on Mason's health problems, yes, I would give you two years of work."

I really had not expected that response. Human beings are innately selfish creatures.

"Does your Mason realize the degree and depth of your devotion?" I asked the question in all sincerity. Based upon my memories, he seemed one of the most unlikely people on earth to inspire such feelings. In no way was I mocking Rebecca. Of all the humans I had known, I considered her to have exceptional character.

"He does."

"I hope he appreciates what he has. So many humans do not."

"He has never taken me for granted. I am certain Mason would make a similar sacrifice for me. There is greater substance to him than he allows most of the world to see."

"No wonder Adam hates him. If Adam did not have high intelligence and technical talent, I could not tolerate him. He would be no more than…"

"A con artist." Rebecca interrupted.

"Yes."

"Please get Catherine safely out of here."

"I'll have Kurt prepare the plane. Fuel was delivered today and it must be pumped into the wing tanks and the load must be balanced."

"Allow Catherine to communicate with her father. Genomex is better defended than it was just a few years ago. If Mason believes the site is under attack, he will authorize a shoot-down."

"As soon as Kurt tells me the plane is ready for flight, I'll have Catherine call."

Mason

I'm not easily intimidated.

That said, I found Rebecca's sister-in-law Sherri intimidating. She was pleasant enough, but she stared at me. No one else dared to do that. I'm unsure whether Sherri understood how she affected me.

In between houses, during one of their numerous moves, Steve and Sherri came to visit us at Genomex. These people should probably live in a tent—or a Winnebago.

They had never been inside the sitRogues Gallerye before; Rebecca had lacked the authority to bring them through the door as visitors. But she had that authority now.

Taking them to Rebecca's labs and anything else of interest meant walking them past the Eleanor Singer Memorial Fountain, with its eternally smiling, cloyingly happy children. No one could see this sculpture for the first time without some kind of comment.

"Oh. I didn't expect to see something like this in a place like this." Sherri's words frequently failed to match her intent.

Steve just laughed and turned to his sister, who was smirking. "As carefully as you described this thing, Rebecca, it's more grotesque than I imagined. The grins on those kids—they all look manic!"

"I hope she told you I had nothing to do with putting this maudlin monument in place." I smiled slightly. I was beginning to like Steve.

"She did. She just didn't prepare me for the size of this thing…and those faces!"

I pointed to the koi gliding through the water. "Even the fish are shamed by this."

Steve laughed. Sherri started to smile, and then just stared. I realized why; she had never heard me make an intentionally funny remark. Sherri probably thought I was humorless.

Neither Steve nor Sherri were the least inclined towards technology. Rebecca said she always had to set anything digital for them, since they were baffled by digital clocks, DVD recorders, and such. Steve had a computer, but he never did more than process words, surf, or send email with it. When he wanted to buy a new one, Rebecca told him exactly what to purchase.

Sherri must have thought Rebecca's work involved adding drops of magic liquid into test tubes containing solutions. When we entered Rebecca's lab, Sherri looked stunned and lost.

"What is all of this stuff?"

Rebecca, thrilled with someone asking her about her instrumentation, proceeded to tell Steve and Sherri all about it.

"I had no idea it would be like this."

"It's been this way for decades: lots of computers, lots of instrumentation, and lots of ways for everything to break down."

"Who fixes it for you?"

"The routine problems I fix, or one of the people who work for me do it."

From that moment, I believe Sherri's evaluation of Rebecca changed. She respected her afterwards.

Rebecca held up one of her lab coats. "I even get a white coat with my name on it."

We continued on to my office, which had not originally been planned, but Steve wanted to see it.

As the office door opened, I turned to Steve and Sherri, and said, "My office is quite plain compared to Rebecca's area. She has all the good toys."

"I deserve all the good toys."

"Well, you do. For what Genomex spends on buying them and supplying them, they ought to be good toys."

"They are."

Sherri's eyes widened as she entered my office. "It's so…modern."

A technician on the catwalk above Podding caught her eyes.

"And you expected?" Rebecca asked.

"Something formal. Mahogany walls. An authentic Oriental carpet created by authentic Oriental nomads. Nineteenth century oil paintings."

She was staring again. She had just described the kind of office I would personally prefer that I had never described to anyone, not even Rebecca. Had Sherri made some good guesses, or did she understand me more than I knew? What had I missed?

Sherri walked right past my desk, and gazed down into Podding Operations. The obvious candidates had long ago been securely podded. The remaining out of control mutants who were hazards to themselves and society were smart enough and cunning enough to stay ahead of the GSA and remain free…for now.

Fortunately, no one was inside the pods below. I believe Sherri would have screamed at the sight of anything so unexpected and macabre.

"Those things down there look like futuristic coffins. What are they?"

I shook my head and feigned a casual attitude. "Those are treatment units. We rarely use them these days."

Sherri turned to me, and yes, she stared. The sight of what I discerned in her face was enough to make me break into an uncomfortable sweat beneath the biopolymer. Plainly Sherri did not wholly believe my answer.

"Can we see your apartment?" Steve asked. I don't think he noticed his wife's moment of insight.

Rebecca referred to our steel cave as an 'apartment' when talking to Steve. She knew he would be displeased to see where and how we lived with the cave's wraparound steel and limited –very limited—space intended to accommodate one person only.

"For Mason's health, we're the only people who go there. If anything needs to be repaired, anyone entering wears something like a spacesuit, with self-contained breathing air.

"Oh," Sherri said, staring at me again.

"Too bad. I was intrigued with your descriptions of the filtered air and water."

"Well, it is neat, Steve, but we'd be disinfecting for days if we gave you a tour."

While not completely true, there was a good deal of truth in Rebecca's excuse.

"We'd better be getting on to dinner. Our reservations are for six o'clock." I hoped that would distract them.

Ever after, I had the queasy suspicion that Sherri had pieced together the lies and half-truths, and harbored a notion there was more to Genomex and me than she had been freely told. Later, Rebecca told me that Sherri asked whether or not I ever changed my clothes or wore anything else. Rebecca did not dignify the (rude, even for Sherri) question with a reply, but laughed.

Mason

Most of my adult life turned dreadfully, miserably wrong. Well, that description fits most of my life.

In the last few years, with Rebecca and Catherine, I discovered parts of myself I thought long-lost and irretrievable. Losing those hard-won gains seemed unavoidable now. My life was continuing to unravel.

One evening, I wandered through the rooms of my virtual house, the one Rebecca wanted to build as far away from Genomex as possible. Then I realized how little point there would be in now building it, without Rebecca and no children and grandchildren to visit. Staying on and continuing to work made more sense. Medical treatment would never be an issue here.

Inquiries at Catherine's school revealed she had officially withdrawn from classes and with not much more work, the purchase of an airline ticket. Catherine's trail stopped at the airport, and like Rebecca, she was a missing person as well.

With my wife and daughter gone missing in the same time frame, the police viewed me with far less suspicion. (I look suspicious to most people merely sitting at my desk.)

Rob turned out to be the last person on site to have spoken to Rebecca. He stopped by my office with a package.

"I don't know what to do with this."

"What is it?"

"A DVD recorder."

"I know nothing about this, Rob."

"I borrowed a VCR from her twenty years ago and never returned it. She wanted me to replace it with one of these."

"Leave it in one of the chairs. Rebecca…has quite a collection of electronics. I'll place it with those things." I had slipped and not caught myself in time. But I wasn't going to worry.

"I also bought some disks. They're here."

"Thanks."

Rob turned to leave.

"Rob?"

He turned.

"Rob, I want to assure you that I continue to actively search for your daughters. There just has not been anything new to tell you for awhile. When I have any news, I will let you know within minutes."

"Thanks, Mason."

Mason

I was waking up too sick to swallow any breakfast. I made my way to my office early enough so that no one would see me make my painful way there. I even insisted now that Dr Prodana come to me. She was pulling blood out of me daily, submitting samples to St Kats with a number instead of a name so no one would know how ill I had become.

Rebecca had left Genomex suddenly, without a word to anyone. Very out of character.

The police would do nothing until adequate time passed to begin a search for a missing person. When that time passed, within an hour Rebecca's car was found at the airport in short-term parking.

Where was she going? I thought about that for a long time before I considered the possibility that she wasn't going anywhere, but was meeting someone.

Combing the passenger lists yielded Catherine's name, and with that, everything began to make some sense.

I held meetings with small groups of doctors who worked there, assuring them there was no policy change and showing them Athellen Lee's results. What dreary business, going over, time and again, the necessity for blotting out the life of an innocent whom I otherwise would have much enjoyed welcoming to this world as an honorary grandchild.

One of those meetings inevitably included Dr Angela Fontenelle. I knew she would do more than listen.

"Mason, you look terrible."

"I feel worse."

"Rebecca tracks your health more carefully than you know. Surely she is dragging you to doctors and tests."

"Rebecca's gone."

"Gone?"

"Kidnapped by Adam. He took Catherine as well. I don't know if they are dead or alive."

"I knew about Adam breaking out of prison. Even with a news blackout, I have good sources. But I had not heard the rest of it."

"The police cannot find a trace, the feds aren't doing any better, and I am beginning to despair of finding either of them alive."

"I have ways of finding information, you know. I will look around. But Mason, you must know Adam is not regarded as he once was among mutants. There aren't many of us left who would help him kidnap someone and hold them captive. He would almost have to recruit among the criminals, including human criminals. He could have developed useful contacts in prison."

"The video evidence supports what you've said. Just the same, any scrap of information you find, please share."

"Immediately."

Rebecca

Catherine and Kurt were feeding Lilith's koi while I studied a compilation of Lilith's notes, when Adam and Lili emerged wearing absurd clothes. They were both wearing floor-length robes of shimmering black and purple silk, not a synthetic, but real silk, with the patina only a genuine silk fabric displays.

The robes were embroidered in gold and red, using alchemical symbols and Hebrew letters.

Lili possessed so much innate personal dignity that even when she dressed for the role of High Priestess in cheesy science fiction movie, she did not appear silly. Adam was not so fortunate.

I must have been gawking.

Like her father, Catherine could not resist making fun of Adam. In this case, he begged ridicule.

"Adam! It's much too late for Mardi Gras and still too early for Halloween! What can it be? An alchemist's convention? A spell exchange between ceremonial magicians? Mason told me about your foray into the Black Arts! He was laughing at the time."

"You have a big mouth, Catherine." Adam did his best to appear grave, but failed.

"You expect me to take you seriously when you're dressed like that?"

"Catherine…" Kurt whispered, "don't."

She hesitated.

"You're a rude kid, Catherine," Adam said.

"You've spent your life hiding behind various poses, haven't you? The serious scientist. The mutant savior. Always something grandiose and heroic. Always a lie, too."

Adam muttered something none of us could understand and stalked off to the hangar. When the door was secured behind him, Kurt spoke up.

"I don't know what Adam used to be like, but he's got a foul temper and I may not be able to stop him. I've seen him blow up at Lilith and my brothers. It's as if he completely forgets where he is. He's not a mutant, so my governor won't affect him."

"He was never long on patience," I added. "Kurt's right. I know it's hard to resist baiting Adam, but it is not the wise thing to do."

"After all the things he did to Mom, Mason, and me, I don't have any other way of getting back at him."

"Adam's done things to me, too…but Haven is not the time or place. Choose your battles carefully, Catherine," I warned.

Kurt seemed shocked. "He's done things to you?"

"Adam periodically invaded the facility Catherine's father runs. During one of those invasions, I had the ill luck to discover Adam. I activated a fire alarm, and Adam had his mutant thug companion throw me against a concrete wall. Fortunately, all I had was a colorful collection of bruises, but I could easily been crippled or killed. Adam does not believe laws apply to him. He thnks he can make his own laws."

"The way Adam tells it, Genomex was staffed with amoral monsters."

"Blithely ignoring the fact that he collected a paycheck from Genomex for years."

"Years? How long was he there?" Kurt sounded surprised.

"Twenty years, from 1978 to 1998."

"To hear Adam tell it, he was there only a short time, long enough to have his ideas stolen and misused."

"With Adam, you must always check the facts. Adam wasn't off in a corner turning out his research for unknown applications. Adam helped run Genomex. He knew about mutants from the first month he was there." Catherine still harbored resentment towards Adam. Dwelling upon that resentment was probably unhealthy.

Kurt chuckled. "That must be why Lilith laughs every time Adam talks about his research being stolen."

"Probably. What were they dressed for, Kurt?" I wasn't sure Kurt would tell me anything, but the question was worth asking.

"Lilith's trying to organize the younger mutants, the ones who are second generation mutants and not sure of who or what they are. She set up some kind of religion, something she calls The Higher Humanity."

"Higher Humanity? I saw flyers about that at school." Catherine managed just the right level of curiosity without appearing too eager.

"Lilith's recruiting. When the Firstborn are decanted, she wants their caretakers to be dedicated to their well-being."

"Why would a young mutant want to live here?"

"The Firstborn will be the beginning of faster evolution of greater intelligence. Anyone who is part of their raising will be part of their success."

Finally I realized why Kurt –and to a lesser degree, his brothers—looked familiar. Kurt looked much lie a young Paul Breedlove, when people knew him as Kurt von Schuler.

"But I thought Lili believed the Genomex mutants were a mistake."

Kurt shook his head. "They won't be mutants. They'll be human. Highly intelligent, unusually healthy humans."

"That's what the new cavern is being fitted for?"

"Yes. Living quarters for the caretakers."

Rebecca

I left Lili in her laboratory and went looking for Catherine. I followed the sound of her laughter coming from the direction of the koi pond.

She was telling Kurt a story in an animated fashion, one they both found very funny. Against all measures of good judgment, I liked Kurt more the better I knew him. So did Catherine. I was especially impressed by the way he treated her, with respect and old-fashioned manners.

But he's Lili's son.

"Excuse me. Catherine, something has come up and we need to speak privately."

"Oh, my."

"It can't wait."

Catherine bounded down from her perch above the water, stopped and turned to Kurt. "I'll finish the story later. You won't believe the way things turn out."

I walked briskly back towards our room, Catherine catching up with me.

"What is it?"

"Keep your voice down after I tell you. I've worked out a deal with Lili."

"What kind of deal?"

I closed the door behind us. I didn't care if Lili monitored what we said or not. "Pack your things, Catherine. You're going home."

"What brought on this?"

"I told Lili that you were at risk with Jesse around. She agreed; Jesse doesn't look stable or trustworthy to her, either."

"So, she's turning me loose? What about you?"

"We made a bargain. You are delivered safely to Genomex and Mason while I stay here with Lili and work for her for two years. In addition, Lili promises to work on treatments to lessen the severity of Mason's condition, or cure him completely."

Catherine sank down onto Adam's desk chair. "I can't leave you here in this pit."

"You have to go. The way things were going, we were going to be here a long time. Mason cannot lose both of us."

"Jesse's crazy. He's just as likely to try to hurt you as me!"

"I agree. But I made the deal, and you have to go. You'd better start packing."

"Mason's got three other children, but only one wife. Why should I be the one to get out of here?"

"Because you are young. Because you have so much of your life yet to live. Because you are Mason's favorite; he sees much of himself in you, Catherine, and has high hopes for you."

"His favorite?"

"Oh, yes."

"How do you know?" Tears welled in her eyes.

"I know. Pack up and be ready to get out of here."

"I never thought I could be anymore than second-best, since he found me so late, and because of what I am."

I shook my head. "Forget all of that. Mason loves you for yourself. He is proud of what you've become in just a few years. Beyond health concerns, he does not care that you're a stealth."

"I was trying to live up to being his daughter."

I smiled. "You are succeeding. Now, please, get your things packed."

"I feel rotten leaving you."

"I know. But I want you to be safe. Lili will have her plane prepared, and you better be ready when the plane is. I don't want her changing her mind."

Catherine hugged me. "I think you must be the least-evil stepmother in the world."

"Thank you."

"I'll try to help Mason find a way out of here for you. Anything I can do, I'll do it."

Catherine packed quickly and when done, went to Lili's lab to contact Mason. I waited for Catherine to return at one end of the koi pond. Kurt was gone, presumably readying the Pseudo Sow.

Adam was one of the last people in the universe whom I wish to see. At the moment, he was also unavoidable.

"Lili just told me about the bargain the two of you made. I thought she was joking at first."

I did not look up from what I was doing, which was my way of showing Adam as little respect as possible.

"And you thought it was a joke because?"

"Two years of your life, Rebecca? You would throw away two years of your life down here in hope that Lili can come up with a treatment to lessen Mason's ills or even cure him?" Adam laughed. Few individuals had a laugh as heartless as Adam's.

"Which part amuses you?"

"Your willingness to sacrifice so much of yourself for Mason's sake."

"Mason matters to me."

"I know. That's the part I don't understand."

"Can you imagine yourself making a similar sacrifice for anyone?"

"No."

"That's why you don't understand. No one else has ever mattered much to you."

"That's nasty."

"It's true, isn't it?" It was, but Adam wasn't going to admit that.

"Look at your own life, Rebecca. You couldn't make any kind of normal life for yourself. There were normal guys who were interested in you, but look at what you did: made some sort of peculiar life with a man no one else could tolerate being around. I haven't seen Mason's medical reports for years, but the adjustments and accommodations required must have been extensive."

"Adam, has anyone told you yet today how deeply offensive you are? What about your life is 'normal'?

Adam opened his mouth, but nothing came out. Realizing he had nothing to say, Adam turned and wandered back towards the room he shared with Jesse.

Mason

As long as my children were children, children I knew only as electronic images, I never felt that I could lose them. The same with Rebecca; as long as she was Dr Steyn whom I could coerce to attend useless 'community' meetings so that I could be in her company, however fleetingly, she, too, was an abstraction that I could not lose.

Now they were all real people to me, and losing them left me more alone than I had ever been in the years before.

Rebecca and Catherine, were both under the control of Adam, whose mental stability became more and more questionable. I knew why he took them. He took them to hurt me. Curiously enough, as Adam inflected more insults and injuries upon my life, he was compelled to bring more and more harm to me, as if our roles were reversed. I wonder what Dr Varady would make of such behavior.

If he hurts either of them, I will find a way to kill him.

I was startled when my private line rang. Only a handful of people knew my private numbers.

"Mason Eckhart."

"Mason, it's Catherine."

"Catherine?'

"They won't let me talk long. I think they're going to return me to Genomex. Tell security…not to shoot at anything unexpected, because I may be part of it."

That was all.

I wasn't much surprised a few minutes later when told I had a message coming in from Adam, with visual contact. Adam never could resist flamboyancy.

"Mason. Aren't you surprised to see me?"

The man had a talent for being tiresome.

I sighed. "I knew you would eventually come up for air and tell the world (once again) how brilliant you are. Your ego requires frequent, heavy feeding."

"I have a shopping list of items I need badly that turn out to be difficult for individuals to purchase."

"You're well-connected with the criminal element. Can't they supply you?"

"Not nice, Mason. I need these things badly enough to propose a trade."

"A trade?" Here it comes.

"You know I have Catherine. I'll give you Catherine in return for these supplies."

Of course I would barter Catherine's freedom. Adam knew that.

"Send me your list." I resigned myself to playing Adam's game.

"As easy as that?"

"There is nothing complex about dealing with a common criminal."

That stung. I could see it in his eyes. Did he persist in thinking of himself as one of the great scientific minds of this time, protector of all mutantkind? Surely he knows by now any good he achieved long ago was counterbalanced by his crimes and excesses? No, not Adam. He still believes his old stories.

He must have no idea that while a few, a very few Genomex mutants still regarded Adam a hero, many more of them—and their unfortunate children—now knew the truth of his role in creating their biological misfortune. Adam was not there to take care of them, but St Katherine's was now that more of them were afflicted. Surely Adam has heard of it?

"Don't bring up that tiresome business about my work at Genomex, Mason. That's all ancient history."

"Ancient history perhaps to you, but not to the people suffering the consequences of your work. However, I was speaking of more recent events: the murder of eleven prison guards, and kidnapping."

"Aren't you curious about Rebecca? She'll be disappointed if I tell her you didn't ask about her."

"I had confidence you would be using her to barter for something you wanted."

"And I will. I just haven't thought of it yet."

"Harm Catherine, and Danielle will be waiting to greet you at the gates of Hell. Harm either of them, and there will be a price to pay with me."

"Catch me if you can. I'll send my shopping list and instructions on where and how to leave the goods. You're going to have to move quickly."

The transmission ended abruptly. To Adam, this was a game. All the lives he affected were game-pieces to him.

Adam would have taken pains to make the transmission untraceable. I wonder if he would have cared that a recording of the exchange would be played later today for the Genomex Mutant Council, an independent association of mutants, mostly successful professionals, with whom I routinely shared news of interest to them. They could make what they would of the recording, call it a fraud or accept it as truth. I never told them what to think.

I had never lied to them, however, and they knew who Catherine was. The first time I walked into a Genomex Mutant Council meeting, I wore body armor and had Catherine with me. Those days were long past, fortunately. Most likely they would accept the exchange as genuine, further darkening Adam's reputation. I strongly suspected they had means of contacting and informing nearly all of the mutants I had mainstreamed over the years. I was careful to never say anything suggesting that I wanted a copy of any mutant census. I had my own list, anyway.

There were other lists as well: the Genomex mutants requiring treatment at St Katherine's, and a small but growing list of mutants whose condition led to an early death. No one doubted my claims of the lethality of their genetic tampering any longer.

So, Adam was selling me back my daughter?

Lilith

"Would you like to see my work applied in a practical way, Rebecca?"

"Biology is not my specialty."

"You understand more of it than any other chemist I've worked with."

Rebecca knew enough to appreciate my work. She would be impressed with what she saw, even if she did not understand the fine technical details. Few people would.

"I'll show you."

She could hardly refuse.

I was quite proud of my work. Research work of this sort typically required dozens of workers, but I had made progress by myself, with only my sons to assist me.

"To the best of my knowledge, what has been done here is unique. No one else has brought together everything required for ectogenesis to be successful."

The gestation room was kept behind a plain steel door keyed to my irises and those of my sons. I did not want Adam in there without me. I could not be sure what he might do. I did not trust him. He might destroy some of it out of jealousy for my successes.

Behind that simple, single steel door, the gestation room extended 150 meters deep and 50 meters wide. Row upon row of gestation units stood, brightly lit. The impression I strived for one of quiet, professional efficiency, not one of science gone mad. I stopped at the closest unit.

"The units are nearly identical, except for minor improvements made in later units. There are a total of 240 units here. When I designed these, I used off the shelf components wherever possible, avoiding expensive, custom parts that could be difficult to replace. Some parts can be found at any hardware store. Nearly all the rest are available from major scientific supply houses."

"Very wise, Lili. Custom fabrication is a pain."

"And this is also much cheaper."

I pointed to what was the analogue of a womb.

"The first step is the careful sterilization of everything. I use a combination of heat and irradiation. After the 'jar' –that's what I call these—is absolutely sterile, we introduce a nutrient solution and cells that have evolved and may attach to the jar walls, to form an analogue of the endometrium."

I watched Rebecca's eyes. Even some technical people were made uneasy or disgusted by a description of the process. Not Rebecca. After years of familiarity with the heroic medicine keeping Mason alive, probably nothing would shock or disgust her.

"When the 'endometrium' is properly prepared, we introduce the embryo. Attachment is not left to chance."

The room was quiet, with the faint hum of fans and pumps, and very little else.

"Once we have an embryo safely attached, then the really interesting process begins. Other groups developed artificial amniotic fluid, but I improved upon all of their formulae. Mine is the best."

"I also had to develop artificial blood. I grow red blood cells compatible with all the embryos, all possible embryos, then add nutrients—minerals, vitamins, amino acids, simple sugars, everything a very small human requires to develop properly. Waste is processed by a unit comparable to one used for dialysis."

"Everything –everything—about each unit is monitored continuously. If I wish to know at 3.43 AM what the temperature and pH is in Jar 4A, I can bring that up in my bedroom computer."

"These fetuses will be fed growth stimulants in a careful manner. Making a human the traditional way requires nine months. These units will complete the task in 11-12 weeks. They'll be fully developed, and will not need special care to stay alive."

"Why the rush?"

"Because I won't live forever, and I want to be certain this job is done right."

"Sadly, not all of the embryos are going to be successful. We monitor all development with care. When an individual begins to fail, we try a few basic techniques to bring them back. However, if they respond poorly to treatment, we stop. We assess how much distress or even pain the individual is suffering. We choose whatever method will end their lives quickly. This is always a terrible time. As soon as we can determine their sex, they are given names. We do not speak of A-734 or Q-079, no, we speak of James or Sharon or Peter or Elizabeth."

"You must have several levels of backup power."

"Naturally. And all systems are independent of Haven."

"Most impressive, Lili, though I'm not sure the world is in need of more people."

"The world needs these people. Worldwide, as the standard of living improves, intelligent women are having fewer or no children. The implications for humanity's future are obvious should that trend continue, with the number of Genomex mutants increasing. My ectogens will not make up all of the differences, but their positive influence will be everywhere.

"Will Adam be the father of all of them?"

"Oh, no, future years of children must have a broad genetic background. Reliance upon Adam –well, really Paul Breedlove—alone would be unwise. No, in another part of Haven I have liquid nitrogen storage of semen of 27 brilliant men in a variety of fields and several different races. I will collect more as I am able."

"Lili, what will you say to one of your children if they come to you, unhappy about the way they were created?"

"Oh, I don't believe that will be a problem. My sons are content and appear emotionally normal."

"But there are only three of them. When you have several dozen, and cannot give them all close attention, they might not be so content. When they learn how people live in the real world, connected by family ties. Even you had a family, Lili."

"I had not considered that."

"You'd better. Humans don't do as well in packs as they do in families."

Mason

Catherine had not sounded like herself. I couldn't expect that she would, given what I had seen on the surveillance video. The brief, cryptic message screamed for explanation, but my impatience would hasten nothing.

My first action was to warn security of a possible hostile arrival, and that Catherine might be used somehow. The discovery of one gunship plunged deep underwater did not eliminate the possibility that there were others, ready to fly.

I would not be taken unawares by another invasion by Adam. That the voice was Catherine's I had no doubt, but Adam might have coerced or tricked her into saying what he wished.

Adam, bane of my life, if you have harmed Catherine or Rebecca, I will see that you suffer for it.

We watched all the approaches, and still we were surprised by the heat signature of a hovering aircraft undetectable by site radar or visual cameras.

But Adam's VTOL was cut up into pieces. How can this be?

We braced for a possible assault from above, following the heat signature as it descended to ground level, prepared for the worst.

Not even Adam could know Genomex was presently defended by surface to air missiles. Hardly anyone knew. I was prepared to let these arrows fly at the first sign of attack, or of harm brought to Catherine.

But nothing happened. Catherine appeared in view, towing a suitcase behind her. And only Catherine appeared.

I hugged Catherine before even thinking about what impression my agents would have of me, because I did not care.

"After I saw the video of your abduction…I feared I might not see you again. Adam will not leave any of us alone."

"Down in Lilith's hole in the ground, I was afraid I'd never see you."

"Adam surprised even me sinking low enough to essentially sell me my daughter in exchange for a pile of scientific supplies."

"Adam?"

"Yes. He sent me a shopping list of items."

"I didn't think Adam was involved in this at all. I wasn't even sure he knew about my being set free."

"What?"

"Lilith agreed to release me in exchange for Rebecca staying and working for her for two years, with Lilith working part of the time to develop a cure for you."

"O Dear God. Two years…"

"Mason, Lilith's in charge. She tells Adam what to do. She has a hidey hole that's a near twin to Sanctuary, except that it isn't damp or or prone to flooding."

"Paul learned from the shortcomings of Adam. Lilith is better than Adam, and I would expect her works to be an improvement over Adam's. Catherine, is she making Genomex mutants?"

I adored my daughter, and tried my best to make the question not sound as if I found mutants loathsome.

"No, no mutants. But what she is making is no less fantastic. She's making people, gestating them in artificial wombs."

"Genomex put a lot of effort and money into an ectogenesis project. No one's been able to make that work."

"Lilith already has. One of her 'sons' flew me here. He's a combination of Lilith and Breedlove's DNA."

"She's too young to have an adult son."

"Oh, Kurt is their son, no question. He looks like both of them. Lilith has found a way to grow a human to maturity in six to seven years."

"Six to seven years?"

"Yeah. They look like anyone else. There isn't anything peculiar-looking about them."

"What about their emotional and intellectual development?"

"Well, they're very bright. Emotionally, well, if you didn't know, you'd think they were a little sheltered or naïve, but not much. The one who brought me here is actually well-mannered and nice."

"Not if he's one of the thugs who broke Adam out of prison."

"No. Kurt wasn't with them."

"And you are sure of that because?"

"He told me. Lilith assigned him to protect Rebecca and me from Jesse."

"Jesse?"

"One day, Adam showed up with Jesse. I don't know who found whom, but Jesse looked disturbed. Lilith didn't trust him, either, so she had Kurt follow us around to protect us, carrying the controller for a kind of governor not requiring a subdermal implant."

"Invented by Lilith?"

"Yeah."

"Lilith is damn dangerous."

"Anyway, Kurt spent a lot of time with us. Rebecca believed him, too, when he said he wasn't part of the attack team."

"Rebecca's at least as suspicious as I am. Do you have any idea where this hidey hole is?"

She shook her head. "Trust me, I paid attention to as many clues as I could find, but there just aren't many. We were in or above the clouds nearly the whole time. About all I can be sure of is that we were in flight for fifty-three minutes, but we could have spent part of that going in a large circle."

"Better than nothing. Come inside. Are you hungry?"

"Not really."

"Later on, we'll order something special. Catherine, I am so glad you are home."

"There must be some way of getting Rebecca out of there."

Catherine's eyes were pleading. She wanted me to have the answers. I wanted to have the answers, but I didn't.

"Assuming Haven is built like Sanctuary, or, given that Lilith constructed this hole in the ground comparable to Sanctuary, and built even more securely, without knowing where the entrances are, and without knowing the key codes for access, getting inside would mean taking down a mountain's worth of rock and dirt and then assaulting Haven with a small army…unless you know of any vulnerable points."

"No. We spent our days looking for vulnerabilities. I wasn't just looking for a way out. I was looking for a way back in, too. I think you're right to think Haven is more secure than Sanctuary. Lilith said it would never flood the way Sanctuary did.

"I'm sure she thought of other refinements as well."

I could be dead by the time Lilith releases Rebecca, if she ever chooses to release her. How will Rebecca even know how much time has elapsed?

"There is one design change I noticed: Lilith's Flying Sow does not plunge into the camouflaged side of a mountain; it hovers all the way down. Doesn't that imply that there are people living or working nearby who would notice planes flying into the same hillside over and over?"

I wobbled, unsteady on my feet. Catherine seized by left arm. I wasn't in any danger of falling, but Catherine thought I was.

"Thank you.

"When did you get so thin?"

"Very recently."

"Does Rebecca know?"

"Not to this degree…but to return to the Flying Sow II…if it hovers, its heat signature will linger for a few minutes at least. An infra-red search—that's a beginning."

"I even went through their food supplies one night, looking for store brands, but I only found nationally-distributed brands."

I smiled. "Nicely done, anyway. You did well to think of that."

"Everything was that way. The dishwasher detergent, the potty paper, everything."

"Interesting that Lilith would do that."

"She wasn't expecting us. We were Adam's little surprise. She plans to bring more people in there, her 'Higher Humanity' group. There was a whole sealed-off area not quite ready for occupation. That's why Rebecca and I had to sleep in Adam's room."

"Adam's room?"

"Without Adam, of course. He must have slept on a sofa somewhere."

"He must have been livid."

"He was. It was fun to watch."

Mason

With Rebecca out there, somewhere, in a high tech hole in the ground, and no one able to find her, Catherine and I turned to each other.

"I've been thinking a lot about school, and I want to transfer, so I'm closer to home."

"You'll lose some time doing that. You'll take longer to graduate."

"I don't want to be far away. Maybe I could even commute."

Catherine knew I was ill. She saw more than my weight loss; she saw I no longer attempted to consume solid food.

She thinks there is a good chance she has lost Rebecca, and she fears she may lose me as well. Who else is left for her?

"We can start looking into local programs."

"When I'm done with school, I want to join the GSA."

"I'm stunned. Isn't this sudden?"

"Yes and no. I had a lot of time to think. Society –civilization—is threatened so many different ways. I want to do something to hold back 'the night'. The GSA seems the best place for me."

I smiled at my earnest and lovely daughter. "If indeed imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then I am overwhelmed."

Grey had never shown a moment's interest in the generations-long tradition of service in our family. He would read about the War of Northern Aggression, but the possibility of service in any branch of the US military never came up.

Grey spoke of making money, buying a large house, driving expensive cars. To Grey, and people like him, their world seems solid and unshakable. Only a savage, a lower life form, would choose to leave civilization and fight. Fight for what?

Like most of his contemporaries, Grey was poorly educated. He had no understanding how a pretty world like his was able to exist. To paraphrase George Orwell, civilization exists because there are men willing to conduct themselves in a less civilized manner to protect it.

Grey did not understand, but Catherine did.

"Missions don't come any more important than the protection and preservation of humanity, but I must warn you: it's a thankless job at best."

"I've noticed."

"I've been characterized as everything from a zookeeper to a Nazi. I had to learn to work to my own standards and not expect anyone above me or outside the GSA to comment on my work, except, of course, when something went wrong."

"I remember the stories."

"Do you think you could track down and capture other mutants, Catherine?"

"Probably. Yeah."

"The majority of Genomex mutants are living openly now. However, that does not mean they approve of mutants hunting other mutants. No small amount of bad feeling is held against GS agents who are themselves mutants. Do you want to deal with that?"

"About the only 'wild' mutants left are criminals. Besides their crimes, I figure they make all mutants suspect."

"Very true. What are you going to do about school?"

"I want to transfer back here and I don't want to be around anything reminding me of Patrick."

"I can arrange for you to sit in on some academy classes. You already know a great deal more about mutants than the typical human recruit. You wouldn't have any problem handling the material."

"Are you trying to discourage me?"

"Not at all. Think you might want to run the GSA someday?"

"Yeah."

"I believe you could."

"You do?"

"Of course. You would bring unique understanding of the problem to the position, and you'd have me to advise you every step of the way getting there."

"What would it take to expand the GSA's authority to include Lilith's uber-people? Lilith's kidding herself if she thinks none of them will turn their superior selves to crime."

"I hadn't considered that, but yes, in a few years…I could rewrite the scope of the agency and have that approved before the first of Lilith's ectogens breaks a law."

"There's nothing to distinguish Lilith's children except their DNA, specifically their mitochondrial DNA."

"Sounds like interesting times ahead."

Rebecca

Foolishly, I had allowed the days to slip past, indulging in the far-fetched hope I would find a way out of my crazy Zen prison, or even less likely, that I would be rescued, delivered from captivity and returned safe and sound to the life and people I loved.

With Catherine gone, I felt claustrophobically trapped. Nightmares about the millions of tons of rock not far above my head disturbed my sleep regularly.

But the days slipped by, nothing changed, and my prescriptions were running out.

"Lili, my medications are nearly exhausted. These prescriptions must be refilled in the next two days."

"Reasonable enough…but there will be a record of the purchase."

"Send Adam to a different branch store every time."

She nodded. "That works."

I should have said, "Send Kurt," because the drug names would have meant nothing to him. But they would have meaning for Adam. Sure enough, on his return, he was curious about my medications.

"Becky, why are you taking Synchronax?"

"My name is Rebecca. If you want to live, you will call me Rebecca."

"Touchy. Is it that time of the month or is it maybe something else?"

I seized the bag from him. "You always did have problems with boundaries. The answer to that question is between me and my doctor, none of your business, none of your concern."

"Here in Haven, I'm the only MD."

I didn't like the look in his eyes. I thought of a half-dozen different extraordinarily rude things I could say to him, the kind of verbiage he'd never heard out of my mouth before, but that I'm sure he'd heard from other women unfortunate enough to be in proximity to him.

"Adam, put a hand on me, and I will beat the life out of you. If what you are can fairly be described as life."

"Touchy, touchy, touchy."

"No, Adam, it's the fact that I don't like you. I know too much about what you've done to like you. The fact that I have to work with you is unpleasant enough."

"Women at Genomex were thrilled with my company."

"None with taste, self-respect, or intelligence. I have all three."

Lilith glided out of her lab. She looked tired and annoyed. "Adam, go work on the plane or empty wastebaskets. Didn't Eleanor teach you not to make a pest of yourself?"

"She told me I was wonderful."

"Several times every hour, no doubt," I smirked.

Lili rolled her eyes. "I believe it. Rebecca, did he get you the proper prescriptions?"

"Yes."

"Good. Why don't we go into the lab and be constructive. Adam, go see if we got our fuel delivery. They've been running a day late and I'm getting annoyed."

I watched everything Lili did carefully, every day. The days were slipping past and I had yet to see any sign that she had put a minute's effort into the problems of alleviating or eliminating Mason's afflictions.

"Lili. Mason's problems. When do we begin working on them?"

And always, when I posed this question in one form or another, she would respond with something very like:

"I've been giving them a good deal of thought. I must work through the issues in my mind first before setting up any experiments."

I had no choice but to conclude that Lili either had no intention of performing work of benefit to Mason, or that such research was so far outside her range of skills and expertise that she would not attempt it.

That's when I became desperate to get away from Haven.

I was walking through an unfamiliar neighborhood. I didn't know anyone who lived there, but walking through it was the only way I had of reaching home, so I kept on walking.

It was not a pleasant day for a walk. The sky was overcast and the air chilly.

Someone pointed out a column of smoke rising into the sky, and explained that Mason Eckhart was dead and the smoke was from his funeral pyre.

I don't remember anything more from that dream, but that was plenty. If dreams are "letters to ourselves", then this one informed me how worried I was that Mason might sicken and die before I could get back to him. The possibility was very real. Mason's health had been failing when Adam kidnapped me. And here I was, locked in a hole in the ground.

I knew from talking to Jesse and Emma that the original Flying Sow had the capability of flying itself, so I had hopes that the Pseudo Sow could do the same. I had no idea where I was, but merely getting outside the bounds of Haven would be a major step towards successful escape.

The hangar door was kept locked. I found electrical tape in Adam's things, and I sat myself down next to the door, reading, anticipating Lilith's weekly grocery expedition. After Lili and Matthew passed through the door, I taped the catch down. No one noticed.

I spent the balance of the active hours in Haven doing my best to avoid Adam and Jesse, not wanting to be the target of Jesse's rage with the possibility of escape looming.

Lilith enjoyed her shopping days. They provided her time with each of her sons in turn, exposing them to the real world outside of Haven, and were much more than the acquisition of supplies.

I waited until everyone was in their rooms that evening. Lilith was dedicated, but she kept regular hours and expected everyone else to do the same. Adam whined about this, but there wasn't much he could do about it.

Before the Flying Sow was dismantled, Jesse had shown me the control panels. Adam had great faith in automated systems, and the controls were surprisingly, shockingly simple. I like to be in control and know exactly what is going on, which the Flying Sow did not allow. I hoped that the flight deck of the Pseudo Sow would be much the same, if not identical, given how similar Haven was to Sanctuary.

I gathered the things brought with me to Haven—the things I would need in the real world outside—and made my way quietly to the hangar door. The door was unlocked, with my tape still in place. I removed the tape, then walked on briskly to the Pseudo Sow.

I all but ran up the ramp, taking time to figure out how to raise and secure it. I wasn't planning on climbing above 10,000 feet, but having the ramp dangling in flight could not be good.

As I prepared to raise the ramp, Kurt glided silently into view.

"I can't let you take my mother's plane. We need it." He wasn't angry or excited. His voice was even and matter of fact.

"Kurt, I have to get away from Haven. If I don't, Jesse will harm me."

"I see the way he looks at you. He looked at Catherine the same way…it's disturbing to see. I cannot imagine you or Catherine doing anything to justify such…hatred. Why does Jesse want to hurt you?"

"Catherine's father, the man I married, caused Jesse's unborn daughter to die. He did not act out of cruelty; the child would have had enormous, frightening powers."

"Did you help him?"

"I did not know he was going to do it. He knew if he told me, I would talk him out of it. Mason loved Jesse like a son; doing this thing did not come easily."

"And Catherine?"

"She was hundreds of miles away. She knew nothing about it."

I had never lied to Kurt before. He had every reason to believe me.

"Jesse has already acted against Mason. He reached into the belly of Mason's daughter-in-law and tore out the son she was carrying. Jesse used to be a good, decent man. He isn't any longer. He's crazy and he wants to get back at Mason and anyone Mason cares about."

"Dr Steyn, I cannot allow you to take the plane, and I cannot take you out of here in it, because I will be found out. But there is one other possibility."

"Tell me."

"Are you afraid of heights?"

"Terrified."

"Well…there is a staircase out of here. It winds around the opening. Most of it is steel mesh."

"I won't look down."

"Try not to. The other thing is, if you have not cleared the staircase before there is a reason to take the plane out of here, I don't know how safe you will be."

"I won't dawdle."

"It's a long way up."

"I'll try it."

"Come with me. I'll show you where the stairs begin."

I dutifully emerged from the Pseudo Sow, and walked beside Kurt.

"Mother says the people outside are weak, stupid, and lazy. But you aren't like that, and neither is Catherine."

"Lili's quite correct about most people, however."

We stopped before a plain gray steel door with no markings.

"This is where it begins."

"Thank you, Kurt. You're giving me back my life."

"You mean a great deal to Catherine. She won't be happy with you here. You'd better get started. Do one thing for me, Dr Steyn."

"Of course."

"Tell Catherine I will never forget her. Now, get going. I'll dim the lights down here; you won't be as inclined to look down."

"Goodbye, Kurt."

"Good luck, Dr Steyn."

I have always loathed steel mesh stairs and walkways. They are too open, permitting a view of sights below, sometimes far below. Steel-deck bridges, several hundred feet above the water were even worse.

Climbing the staircase snaking about the Sow II's entry and exit portal required me to be both quiet and quick. Neither came easily. I wanted to scream. I wanted to hug the inner wall. I forced myself forward, to relentlessly climb, to rest as infrequently as possible, and to never look down, down to where the Sow II sat, bathed in light, glittering through the gaps.

Don't look down. Well, I didn't, but the light from below kept reminding me how far behind I had left the hangar floor.

In good lighting, or in daylight, I would not have been able to make the ascent at all. Only the deep darkness made the climb possible, and I was grateful for that.

I began to wear down, taking more and more frequent breaks. I could not tell how far away the 'top' was, since the apparent center was an ill-defined dark area.

A handful of times I sat down and listened. The hangar was typically silent. I wanted it silent; I did not want anyone taking a late evening flight.

I began to smell the world outside long before I saw or heard it: the scent of green, growing things on a summer's evening well past sunset, with heavy dew settled onto everything. For the last few turns of the spiral, I quickened my pace. Suddenly, I was outside.

I had been underground so long I had forgotten what summer smelled like. And it was not still and quiet. The air was filled with the trilling and song of crickets and cicadas.

Down below me in the real world, I could see a regular pattern of streetlights. I couldn't tell how far away they were, but between me and the lights, there was a lot of terrain. Waiting until morning was out of the question. Lili would send someone looking for me when I turned up missing and I did not wish to be found.

Fortunately, the night was clear. I took my bearings from the stars and set off for the lights.

I didn't know what was out there, but I doubted I would find any humans lurking in the darkness. Most people are afraid of the dark, but I am not, not once my eyes have adjusted to it. People avoid the darkness and most animals will avoid people. I was concerned with what I would find once I reached the lights, however. I had to find a telephone, without finding any people inclined to harm me.

I walked through a lot of dried brush. I think I was mostly walking through neglected pasture. The terrain was too uneven to be tilled.

Once I collided with a mesh fence. That was the closest I came to falling. For a long while, I was walking downhill, but the land became undulating and I descended below sight of the lights. I kept to a straight path by checking the position of the stars. I picked my way across a wide stream or drainage ditch, then scrambled up a steep, rocky bank, suddenly finding myself at the perimeter of a large industrial park.

What I wanted to find was a plant or warehouse that worked around the clock. A large gathering of people would be safer than one or two. I stayed in the shadows as much as possible, not wanting to be seen first by anyone I found.

Every building looked empty at this time of night, with no cars outside and no lights on in offices. Even the cleaning crews must have finished hours ago.

I had been walking for a long time and was really not in condition for it. The industrial park went on and on; I might wander for miles without seeing anyone.

But, there was a better way. I knew that as soon as I saw the petunias cascading over the side of a ceramic planter. The plants were watered, meaning that the business within was functional. The planter was large and heavy. Lifting it took the last shred of will and determination I owned. I heaved it through the glass door.

The broken glass shattered magnificently and made a lot of noise. An alarm within sounded immediately, which was exactly what I wanted. But I took no chances. I pushed the remaining shards of glass out of my way and climbed through the door.

The receptionist's phone glowed faintly in the gloom. I picked it up and dialed 911.

"I want to report a breaking and entering."

The alarm, of course, was still going off. I cannot imagine what the dispatcher thought, but I told her I wanted the police, and quickly. I considered explaining something about my…situation, but realized that would make me appear crazy or criminal or both.

I had one more call to make. I dialed one of Mason's hyper-secret phone numbers. He'd panic when he heard this ring, but he would answer it at any hour.

"Mason Eckhart."

"It's Rebecca, Mason. I'm free."

"Where are you?"

"This sounds silly, but I don't know."

"Why is that alarm going off?"

"Because I had to break in here to use the phone. I expect the police any minute. I called them, too. Mason, I have to go. I can see their lights outside."

I turned on the interior office lights and waited patiently for the first cruiser to appear. I wanted to be seen plainly, and I also wanted it plain that my hands were in open view and I had nothing to hide.

The officer who showed up first looked very young.

I had seated myself on an office chair in an open space, placing my purse three meters away with my GSA and other identification spread out in front of it for inspection.

"Good evening."

"Are you the one who called?"

"Yes."

"Someone broke in here?"

"Me. It was the quickest way to get help. If you'll look at my identification, you'll see that I am GSA, and that I do match the photos."

"This isn't making a whole lot of sense."

"It will."

He picked up each piece and compared everything to me. I seemed to match.

"What are you doing out here?"

"I've been held captive for a while. I escaped tonight. I've been walking a long time. My name should also appear on lists of missing persons. The GSA will pay for all of this damage."

"That's quite a story."

I nodded. "Best part is, it's all true."

"You're going to have to come out to the car while I check out everything."

"Gladly."

He put me in the back of the car, locking me in, of course. I didn't mind. I wasn't even sure where I was, but that was nowhere near as important as the fact that I was free of Haven, Lilith, and Adam. I dozed off while he was checking everything. I didn't care how long that took, just that I was no longer living under millions of tons of rock.

"Dr Steyn?"

"I must have gone to sleep."

"People tell me a lot of crazy stories, but yours is true. Several federal agencies have been hunting for you."

"I've been held in a hole in the ground."

"An ambulance is coming for you."

"Ambulance?"

"You're all cut up, covered with insect bites, and you have a nasty gash right on your hairline that is probably going to need stitches."

"I feel fine."

"You're probably keeping going by adrenaline and will power. You've been through a lot."

Well, I'd been through even more than that. Afterwards, I was told that I presented a less than wholesome appearance. The gash in my scalp needed five stitches, my arms were scratched and bitten, and my clothes were torn. Blood had dried in my hair.

Mason

When Rebecca's phone call first came through I thought it was some kind of unfunny joke. The sound quality was poor, and she did not sound right. But hardly anyone knew that number.

She sounded scared. Rebecca does not frighten easily, nor is she prone to panic. (Helpless women are so tedious.) But between the sound of her voice and what Catherine had told me, I could not get to her quickly enough. I left in such a hurry I nearly left Catherine behind…not that she had dawdled. She ran to the helicopter wearing socks and carrying her shoes. I was in no mood to wait for anything.

When Catherine described the desperate bargain Rebecca had made with Lili Chen, I feared I would never see her again. Lili would never let her go. I wasn't certain what Adam might do to her, but I had a pretty good idea that Jesse might kill her, since Emma had left him.

None of our attempts to locate Haven yielded useful information. Lili had hidden Haven as skillfully as Adam had hidden Sanctuary.

I kept busy. I spent a good deal of time with Catherine, but inside, my helplessness in finding Rebecca made me desperate and depressed. Privately, I was miserable. I felt unworthy of the sacrifices Rebecca had made to return Catherine to me, while I could do nothing to rescue her. Isn't that what I should have been able to do, rescue my Rebecca? After all, I commanded a small army, and with a little trouble, I could summon multiples of their number. But all this time, I had no notion of where Rebecca was held.

Hence my frantic morning flight into what remained of the hours of darkness.

When we alighted from the Genomex helipad, all we had were GPS coordinates from the phone Rebecca had used. Using the area code of the source phone, my agents were able to carefully search a limited area for Rebecca's transponder and from that they determined additional coordinates. While in mid-flight, the local police contacted me; Rebecca's claim of being GSA and the victim of a kidnapping had proven true, as unlikely as it must have sounded.

They directed me to a small rural hospital where they had taken Rebecca, assuring me that they only wanted to err on the side of caution. Rebecca was dehydrated, exhausted, and cut up by brush, but nothing seemed seriously wrong.

The sky was turning lighter in the east when we touched down in the hospital parking lot.

Having Catherine with me helped. I intentionally present a forbidding appearance. Once Catherine was introduced as my daughter, the doctors and police assumed she was Rebecca's daughter as well. Catherine did not correct them. People spoke more freely than they would have done to me alone. Catherine made me more approachable.

Rebecca was sleeping. She had been given a sedative, and was now deeply asleep. I did not have the heart to wake her.

I was not prepared for the thinness of her face. "What has happened to her, Catherine?"

"Neither of us had much of an appetite. We didn't trust Lilith's food, anyway. Rebecca believed it might be spiked with something to keep us docile and quiet."

"It's possible. Control, control, control. Breedlove and Adam all over again."

I turned to one of my agents. "Go and get the helicopter refueled. Find breakfast somewhere and bring enough back for the other agents and Catherine."

"Why aren't you eating?" She sounded like Rebecca.

"I'm not hungry, and when I do eat, it tends not to stay eaten."

"Even the pink stuff?"

"Even that."

The gash on Rebecca's head had been stitched and some of the blood cleaned up. The police told me she must not have felt it while focused on escape, although it looked much worse when they found her. They had not been sure what she was at first, but everything she said was verified.

"The direction she said she walked in is empty for miles; there's nothing out there. She had to walk miles through the brush in the dark."

They seemed amazed by this. I was not. Rebecca was not afraid of the dark.

Rebecca's escape would panic Lilith and Adam, because she might just be able to find her way back. Haven was now vulnerable. Would Lilith be desperate enough to fly the Pseudo Sow by daylight in search of Rebecca? She must know there was a good chance the area was now carefully monitored by satellite in visual and infrared scan.

Rebecca

Mason says I sleep like a prey animal, waking at any sound that is out of place. Well, he may be correct, but it is a useful tendency.

I found myself waking up slowly, muddled and fuzzy in my thinking. I could not sort out where I must be. Nothing sounded as it should, not like our steel cave, not like Laura Varady's house, and not like Haven. But, it was so very hard to wake up.

"Mason."

Mason was sitting beside the hospital bed I was in. He smiled. "At last. There you are."

"Here I am. Been waiting long?"

"A few hours."

I heard Catherine's laughter and turned to see her sitting on the other side of the bed.

"We've really only been here about ninety minutes. Some of that we spent talking to police, and having breakfast."

"The police. They brought me here. I remember now."

"About forty-five minutes ago I received an angry phone call from the site manager of a branch of Alacron LLC. I assured him the GSA would cover all damages and take care to replace the flowers. I'm not sure he believed me."

"Oh. That. It seemed like a good plan at the time."

"It was a great plan."

I reached up and touched my forehead. "Someone did needlepoint on me."

"You required several stitches to close the gash."

"Oh, yes. I think I collided with a fence post, but in the dark it was hard to tell. Do I have to stay here?"

"Is there somewhere you would like to go?"

"Home. I want to go home."

"Home awaits."

I shifted my legs and became aware how sore I was, even though I was feeling the effects of a painkiller.

"I took quite a hike last night."

"You have the bites and scratches to prove it."

I felt the remaining dried blood in my hair. "I must look a little scary."

"We're glad to see you, blood, bites, and all."

"You'll be fine after you scrape off the grit," Catherine said. "We brought some clean clothes and shoes. I think you're going to want to throw away what you wore here."

I willed myself to sit up in bed, then swung my stiff, sore legs over the side facing Mason.

"I didn't think I was going to see you again, Mason."

"I had my doubts. Catherine told me all about Lilith's hole in the ground. How did you escape?"

"I didn't exactly 'escape'. One of my keepers showed me a back door." I turned back towards Catherine. "Kurt."

"He was a good guy. Maybe Lilith has a revolt on her hands." Catherine smirked.

"Could be." I slid down from the bed. "Where are those clothes?"

Catherine plucked up a plastic bag from the floor and brought me the clothes. Then she hugged me.

"We've been trying to figure out some way to get you out of there. Short of bringing down half the hill, we couldn't come up with anything…and that was only if we knew where Haven was."

"Do you think you could find Haven?" Mason asked.

"Maybe. First, I have to change out of this lovely gown." I was a mess. And something else. "I smell, don't I?" I asked Catherine.

"Yes."

I rolled my eyes at her, and padded off toward the bathroom.

"We like you anyway," Mason said.

I stopped and turned to face him. "Thank you." He was smiling slyly, very pleased with himself. "You have the sneakiest smile of anyone I've ever known."

Catherine laughed. It was true.

"My smile is one of those qualities my enemies find so endearing."

"Your friends, too."

Lilith

Rebecca always enjoyed a solid professional reputation at Genomex. She worked hard, and was respected for the unembellished, honest, succinct reports she generated.

She had given her word to stay behind and work for me. I never considered the possibility of her not keeping her promise. Nevertheless, it was 10 AM, and she had yet to appear in my lab. I became concerned that something had happened to her. I put down my samples. On the way to Rebecca's room, I came upon Adam and Jesse tinkering with a pile of electronic junk.

"Adam, have you seen Rebecca this morning?"

"Who?" Adam did not look up from his junk.

Adam must be in one of his obnoxious moods. I should throw him and his unbalanced follower out of here.

"Rebecca Steyn."

"Oh, her. I think she left." Adam sounded excessively casual.

"Left?"

"She doesn't seem to be in Haven. Jesse and I searched everywhere. We even drafted your pathetic little canine feral Mandy and had her sniff around the place."

Adam's manner was casual in an annoying, calculating way. He was trying to be irritating. He was succeeding.

"Why didn't you say something hours ago?"

"Well, she's long, long gone, Lili. Mandy says the trail is hours and hours old. I did not want to upset you needlessly."

How thoughtful you are, Adam.

"Where is this trail and where does it lead?"

"Up and out."

"Meaning?"

"The access shaft stairs. You never thought anyone would climb those stairs except in an emergency, but Rebecca appears to have done exactly that."

"How did she get into the hangar?"

"I have no idea."

"Shouldn't we be going after her?"

"If it was dark outside, yes. During daylight hours, we'd attract attention."

"Damn."

"Face it, Lili: you didn't have any idea how to hold up your part of the bargain. Rebecca figured that out. She's not stupid."

"I was giving the problem a great deal of thought."

"How was she supposed to understand that?"

"I suppose she wouldn't."

"Lili, Rebecca's a fool about only one thing, and that's Mason Eckhart. About everything else, she's pretty sharp."

Rebecca

Washing off some of the dirt and clean clothes made me feel a lot better. After seeing what was left of the clothes I had worn last night, I agreed with Catherine that they were not salvageable.

I emerged somewhat more presentable from the bathroom. "I'm ready. Let's go."

Catherine took a few steps to stand near Mason. Not until then did I notice he was once again using a cane. She was ready to help him, but with a focused, deliberate effort, he rose without assistance. His face had looked thin, but not until he stood could I see how gaunt he had become. He saw my alarm.

"Rebecca, there is no need for the panicked look you are wearing. I've been worse. Every day I grow stronger. I am recovering. Catherine will vouch for this."

She nodded.

Mason took my arm when he reached me. "We'll hobble out together."

Which we did. I wasn't sure who was helping whom. The truth was, I was unsteady on my feet.

"We've already collected your purse," Catherine said. "It's in the helicopter."

"Thanks." I turned to Mason. "Did Catherine tell you Lilith broke Adam out of prison to be her assistant?

"Yes," Mason smirked. "It's about time he learned some humility and it sounds like Lilith is teaching him well."

"He's not a happy boy, not at all."

"So Catherine told me. But hearing it again is pleasing. Adam's never been subordinate to anyone but Paul."

"If I can find the back door again, will someone go in after them?"

"Absolutely. But it won't be me or any of my people. Since Catherine was released, she and I have spoken with the heads of several agencies who want Adam and Lilith cornered and caught badly, as much as I do. Adam has broken so many laws he may need several lifetimes to serve all the sentences."

"How long would an android live?" Catherine asked.

"I have no idea, but he's not going back to an ordinary prison. A special place is being constructed for him and Dr Chen, a place underground. Should another of Paul's nightmares try freeing them, they'll first have to burrow deep into the earth. An antique missile silo from the 1960s is being remodeled specifically for the purpose of containing them. It will even have a sun room. Two hundred meters down, with light balanced like sunlight so they will not be able to complain about these conditions."

"Another hole in the ground!" I laughed.

"Yes. We've learned something from Adam."

"Doesn't that qualify as cruel and unusual punishment?" Catherine asked.

"And hence, be unconstitutional?"

"That objection was raised as soon as I suggested the underground prison. But the Constitution applies only to humans, which they are not."

The three of us walked slowly back towards the parking lot entrance. Catherine and Mason flanked me. I put on a brave show, but I was sore and exhausted.

"It's good to be outside in the sun again."

"We aren't meant to be subterraneans."

"Catherine, you must have told Mason what Lilith said about ectogenesis."

"As much as I heard."

"Well, I've seen what she's doing. She's making it work. I've seen the chambers. She's taken all the principles and theoretical work, and brought it all together into a practical, functional procedure."

"Catherine said Lilith claimed three sons by the process."

"That's another aspect of Lili's work. She has developed means to hasten gestation and dramatically shorten time to mature size and adulthood."

"This sounds more and more like Brave New World."

"Lili's work is exactly that, except that she's making only alphas, hyper-alphas at that. She's using eggs implanted with her own exceptional cut and paste DNA."

"What is Adam doing with her?"

I laughed. "Adam is Lilith's assistant. He didn't seem to be bringing more to the project except refined lab skills." I laughed again. "Lab skills, and the fathering of hundreds of developing embryos! I saw them, Mason, swimming in artificial amniotic fluid!"

"Hundreds?" Mason did not surprise easily, but this was bizarre.

"For now, there are hundreds. Not all of them will survive. The weak ones will never develop; she'll allow those to die, the way a gardener culls weak seedlings."

"She has this all planned?"

"From animal work, she has a good idea of how development will go. Only the strongest and most vigorous will complete gestation."

"This sounds obscene."

"It is. The words are Lili's, not mine." I continued. "Of the children who are decanted –she uses the vocabulary of Brave New World deliberately—she is prepared to cull a majority of them and retain perhaps five percent of the most brilliant and physically hardy."

"Echoes of Paul Breedlove's Nazi beginnings without the racist agenda. What will she do with her culls? Murder them?"

"No. They'll be intellectually and physically superior to most of us. While maintaining an elite core group, she will carefully distribute the others to orphanages, and in the long term, she believes they will make a significant improvement to the wider gene pool."

I did not approve of Lilith's plan, but I could not pick a flaw in the logic of her thinking.

"Won't people notice children who grow up so quickly?"

"She'll withdraw treatment. Once outside of her care, they'll grow the same as other children."

"So, in about 20-25 years we'll start seeing people with a vague resemblance doing well in a variety of fields, coming from all over?' Catherine asked.

"Yes, except that their brothers and sisters raised entirely under Lilith's tutelage will have blazed their way through life years before."

"This project is a blasphemy."

"Yes. I've given a lot of thought to the ethical aspects. Even if Lili is captured and prosecuted for breaking Adam out of prison, I think her ectogenesis project is legal. I don't believe there is any way to shut it down legally, certainly not after she has decanted individuals who are physically sound, thoroughly human, bright, and indistinguishable from anyone conceived and birthed in the traditional way. Lilith's assistants, her sons and the mutant cultists would carry on without her. Stopping the project may be impossible."

Lilith

Adam was just not well-informed about matters not concerning…Adam. He really had never heard of St Katherine's. Mason Eckhart's mainstreaming program, dubious at first, turned out to be as presented, nothing more, nothing less. Only criminals or psychologically disturbed mutants ever dropped out of the mainstreaming program, and back into the 'underground', so Adam never heard of the hospital. I was dubious about St Katherine's myself when I first heard of it, and that Mason Eckhart was behind its creation.

Over time, I never heard anything suspicious about St Kat's, and I was watching closely. But I never heard of a mutant disappearing after admission or behaving oddly after treatment. I heard no suggestion of experimentation on mutants.

Mason Eckhart was an odd man, but whatever task he took on, he devoted himself wholeheartedly to its completion. St Kats appeared to be one of those tasks, with no hidden purpose or secret malevolent function.

"Lili, what is this St Katherine's Hospital?"

I was very busy. I hoped Adam would go away and leave me to my work. "It's a hospital for mutants funded by Genomex. Eckhart started setting it up in 2008, refurbishing run down St Katherine's Hospital, creating a unique facility for mutants. I'm surprised you've never heard of it."

"Did Genomex run out of space for their chambers of horrors?"

"Get with the times, Adam. Genomex got out of the horror business in late 2007. Maybe Eckhart had a religious experience while he was podded, because he changed everything after he came out of stasis. This hospital is not a trap or a con. Mutants go into St Kats for treatment, if there is one for their particular affliction, and then they are discharged. They go back to their lives."

"That's impossible with Mason involved. Nothing he ever does is that straightforward or benevolent."

"Adam…my patience is wearing thin. Your fixation upon Eckhart is tiresome. He's cleaning up the mutant catastrophe you and Paul made. He's not the AntiChrist. Why don't you obsess over some of our real problems, such as improving storage or nutrient monitoring of the undecanted?"

No wonder no one wanted to work with this man.

"I just don't believe it."

"Well, St Kat's does serve Eckhart's mission of containing the hazards mutants present to society."

"One day all these people will be loaded up like cattle and dragged off to a remote podding center."

I closed my eyes and shook my head. Adam just did not understand. Mason Eckhart had not magically transformed into the savior of all mutants. He just applied a more humane strategy to achieve tha same goals. The mainstreamed mutants liked living out in the open, free to live without constant fear. Most of them supported the prosecution and containment of criminal and insane mutants. Eckhart made no secret of the GSA'a vigorous and ruthless pursuit of such individuals.

Eckhart's overall strategy was effective and humane, but I doubted it would ever achieve complete success.

I roused myself from my somber reflections. I stood up, stretched, and tossed my lab coat into my chair.

"Adam, let's go see for ourselves."

It's difficult to surprise Adam, but I had succeeded.

"Shake off your stupor, Adam, we're going on a fact-finding expedition." Adam remained rooted to his chair.

"What are you talking about, Lili?"

"Do you want to know the truth about St Katherine's or not? Let's stop speculating and find out first hand."

He rose slowly. "Lili…security there must be like Genomex. We can't just walk in."

"I'm told that that is exactly what we can do. The public can walk right in through the front door." I laughed. "It's really quite clever, Adam: Eckhart has hidden a treatment center in plain sight, and because it does not appear extraordinary, no one becomes curious about the patients."

"I think this is foolhardy."

"At the first indication of a problem, we will leave."

Adam followed me reluctantly to the plane.

"What will you say, Adam, if St Kat's is exactly what it is claimed to be?"

"That just cannot be."

I shook my head. Adam had an answer for everything. Not always the most rational answer, but always an answer. Any matter related to Mason Eckhart elicited an emotional, irrational response. I had learned not to listen carefully to these rantings.

"My sons are all busy with tasks that desperately need doing. Jesse can earn some of his keep around here by acting as pilot, and staying with the plane while we go on our fact-finding expedition. Go find him."

Jesse's usefulness and disinclination to find or invent a task that would make him useful was a sore point between Adam and me. All Jesse ever seemed to do was eat, sleep, and brood. While Rebecca and Catherine were here, he also spent time menacing them.

"Jesse may not want to go. Half a dozen federal agencies are looking for him."

"Too bad. I need a pilot and Jesse is available. He has to do something, Adam. My sons are becoming resentful of his free ride. I want him to fly us to St Kats. Now, Adam."

Adam said nothing but turned and wandered off towards the room he shared with Jesse, a hot water heater, a washer, and a dryer. He emerged with a sullen, dirty-looking Jesse. I made a mental note to have Adam run Jesse through the showers when we returned. If Jesse was going to live in Haven, he wasn't going to stink.

Rebecca

"You were gone a day before anyone was certain you were missing."

"I thought that might happen. I should have been more careful, but it was the middle of the day and Catherine was waiting."

"Please don't ever take a chance like that again."

"I won't."

"The agents who interviewed Laura Varady were told you had packed your car, and were coming back here."

"I was. I'm back now." I was still fearful of this particular conversation.

"But that is not the whole of it?"

"I shook my head. Mason, I'll never leave you. But I cannot go on living here. Too many terrible things have happened on this site. I have to live somewhere else."

"You want to live offsite. I suppose that could be managed, but there would be security issues. I'm unsure how practical it would be."

"I can't live here. I'm not sure I can work here. If you won't leave with me, we'll have to make some accommodation. I'll visit you or better, you'll visit me. I won't give you up. I want nothing more than to be with you. No one else has ever loved me back."

I felt tears welling up. I cursed myself for being weak and losing control.

"You're the only one who didn't want something from me. You only wanted me."

"I've given a lot of thought to you. I haven't thought about much else. You need to know something else. I'm carrying your son. Marcus Grey."

"Given that, what other choice have we?"

"I have one condition. It is not negotiable."

"Which is?"

"You resign, and we leave this nightmare behind. Forever." There. I'd said it out loud.

"No one else has the stomach to do this job."

"Very true. But if you fell through an open manhole tonight and were never seen again, someone would be appointed to replace you."

"You know what is at stake. What if my replacement lacked my devotion to duty?"

"No one will match your dedication. Perhaps the job you'll been doing will have to be divided among two or three people. I will not raise your son with a long-distance father. I will raise him with you, beneath the same roof, in the same household, knowing you, or I won't raise him at all." There. I'd said that out loud.

I had surprised him once more. Mason's history was riddled with loss. Now, I was bringing the possibility of yet another loss."

"You would give him up to strangers?" he asked, disbelieving.

"My pregnancy is maintainable only by adhering to a medication schedule. I would stop taking the drugs. Simple as that. I will miscarry in a few days, at most 10 afterward. My doctors made clear that keeping up with the medication was critical for the next four months."

"Rebecca, no…"

"Life offers no guarantees. But a child with two living, competent parents is best raised by them."

"I won't argue otherwise, but this job is my life…what I've lived for."

"This job will become the death of you."

Mason, can this job be more important than your son? Than me? Your own health and life? I know you better than that, at least I believed I did.

I could tell by his eyes he was struggling to sort out all the factors and reach a balance. Mason couldn't imagine anyone else in charge of Genomex/GSA. He had never seriously considered leaving the job.

"The war you're fighting is unwinnable. Humanity's pedigree is now tainted. Oh, you've delayed the catastrophe by several generations, but the wild mutants, the ones making babies, are the crazies and the criminals. They'll make more crazies and criminals. You've won over the sane and decent mutants to your logic, in essence, culling the sane and decent. The next generations will be far more trouble."

For Mason, this was no shocking revelation. His formal education did not include genetics but he understood the principles. Privately, he admitted anxiety about 'wild' mutants, but I'd never heard him say anything about the way his own policies would select future generations for the traits of 'wild' mutants.

He closed his eyes for a moment, then said. "Yes. I believe you are correct. But wouldn't I be abandoning command the night before battle?"

"No. You've been fighting battle after battle for years. You've accomplished many concrete, positive things, but you don't give yourself proper credit for them. The medical treatment for Genomex mutants at St Katherines is your greatest achievement, and the most overlooked. These people have nowhere else to go where their conditions are understood and they are handled in a humane fashion. They ought to rename it St Mason's."

I was not exaggerating or being excessively dramatic. St Kats was the only hospital in the world where a Genomex mutant could describe their afflictions with complete honesty, be taken seriously, and be treated with respect, not like a candidate for the psychiatric ward.

"What would I do?"

"Work at getting your health back. Build the house you've planned. Write the books you talked about writing. Raise your son. Enjoy your grandchildren. Love me."

"When must I decide?"

"Now. If you have any ambivalence about choosing between Genomex and your son, you should stay here. I don't want to hear regrets forever after, and I don't want our son to hear such regrets."

Our son? What a novel possibility. I still cannot get used to it.

Mason stood there, saying nothing. I wanted to shake him or scream at him, or quite possibly, both.

"Didn't you tell me you wanted to leave in 1987?"

"And I couldn't because the twins were on the way."

"Can this be a difficult choice?" I asked.

Mason hobbled a step towards me. "Let's be done with Genomex, and go to personnel to give notice."

I embraced him tightly, and was horrified by discovering how thin he was under his clothes.

"Mason, there's so little left of you."

"I've been much worse. I've started putting weight back on. I think I may have lost my older children. Grey still won't speak to me."

"They have only one father, and you've been good to them. Time will work in your favor. They will want to know their youngest brother, won't they?"

"You're probably right. Let's be done with Genomex, and to personnel to give notice. We have to get there before Ms Shaeffer bolts for the parking lot."

Rebecca

I don't know what woke me. I sat still and silent as I could, and listened intently for anything that did not belong. The electronics generated a faint background noise. This was slightly changed when Mason walked between the units and me. I had noted that when he rose in the middle of the night. That difference was what I heard now, the change caused by someone walking past the equipment. But I could feel Mason next to me.

Just to remove the last fragment of doubt, I reached and touched his arm, sheathed in biopolymer, then his hand, gloved in leather. There were horror stories of spouses killing spouses in the dark, but whoever was out there was not Mason and meant us no good.

Slowly, silently, I reached down to the floor and found my GSA automatic just under the bed. Kept this way, I had to be consciously thinking about my actions, reducing the chance of a mistake.

I had not been raised around guns. Mason insisted I spend hours and hours in training, not only to improve marksmanship, but to increase the likelihood that I would use a weapon effectively. It is against human nature to kill another human; that nature has to be overcome by conditioning. Armies and police departments had used such training for years. And there I was, painstaking conditioning yielding a careful trained response. There was no time to wake Mason.

"I want to see your faces."

I knew the voice. I hoped it would be someone else, but who else could have passed through steel?

He switched on some of the lights. Jesse's eyes looked crazy.

Oh, Jesse, bright, sweet Jesse. Please, God, don't make me do this.

"I wasn't expecting this, Rebecca."

"I'm a light sleeper. Jesse, you know I'm trained nearly as rigorously as a field agent. Leave now."

"I can bounce bullets safely away."

"Until you need to breathe."

"Mason is the root of all this evil. That's why he has to die."

"If you want to blame someone, blame Paul Breedlove. Everything goes back to him. Mason was only part of the cleaning crew."

"He enjoys godlike power over our lives."

"Untrue. Last chance, Jesse. Leave, or I will empty every round into you. You're not going to kill Mason."

I don't think Jesse believed me. Watching too much television filled with weak women who cannot act to defend themselves or their families will distort your judgment.

He took a step towards Mason, the last he ever took. I was good as my word. I had tracked Jesse and had aim at the center of his chest, the only way to deal with a threat like this. I made every shot a kill shot.

Had he reached Mason and massed, he would have crushed him easily.

Even as Jesse collapsed to the floor, blood everywhere, I fired until there were no more rounds life.

Mason startled to full wakefulness.

"I've just killed Jesse."

Blood was on everything. Killing someone at close range is messy, not like the movies. Fortunately, my training had prepared me for this as well.

"I should have thought of this. He designed part of the system and would know how to turn off sensors after he passed through the steel doors. You did the right thing, Rebecca."

"What do we do now?"

"Call the police. We cannot hide what has happened. This is home invasion. Disgruntled employee breaks into supervisor's home. Other people heard him threaten me."

"But he isn't armed."

"Did he threaten you or me?"

"Yes."

"How could you know he was not armed? I doubt there will be any consequences. What a waste of a fine young man."

"Mason, I feel so strange."

"You would be odd if you did not. Get dressed. I will call security and have them get spacesuits for the police."

I walked around the bed, expecting to find a shattered body.

"Mason, hold off on the phone call for a moment."

"Why?"

"Jesse seems to be evaporating. Can you increase the airflow through here and exhaust it though several different lines of ductwork?"

It was true. The blood was lifting from all the surfaces and vanishing.

"His last thought must have been intangibility. He's dispersed and unconnected now."

"Vent quickly. Don't take a chance of the molecules coming back together coherently."

"This is a gift from the universe, Rebecca."

"We should take it as a sign to get out, and get out now. This hour."

"Where would we go?"

"Drive straight through to Steve and Sherri's. They have that barn of a house. They'll hardly know we're there."

"Sherri stares at me."

"Stare back. Mason, it's time to go. Wake up Catherine."

Mason

Fitting everything into the car took a few tries. I wasn't about to trust the case carrying General Gray's flag to movers, and I wanted it carefully placed for travel. A chain of people had taken great care of it, and I wasn't going to be the one to damage it.

I had decided not to give the flag to Grey. The original symbolism of the flag, of the Confederacy, the Lost Cause, and all the rest, good and bad, were no more than historical curiosities to me, as I suspect they were to my mother (who, after all, married a Yankee).

A Grey served under Pershing in the Great War, one under Bradley and another under Patton in WW2. My uncle Robert Grey served Powell in Vietnam, and died there, or the flag would have become his. What I had been doing at Genomex most of my years here was a different kind of war, but a war nonetheless.

General Grey's flag now possessed an abstract meaning, symbolizing family, honor, and duty. Honor and duty? Grey? Grey was unworthy of ownership.

Catherine was well worthy of the flag, but she intended to be a genealogical dead end.

Now I had hope of someday giving the antique to someone who would not grow up to be the tame puppy Grey had become. I would make certain of that.

I had not moved the family heirloom in twenty years. I placed it on the floor of the trunk, with a folded blanket providing padding.

"Can I get a good look at that in the daylight?" Catherine asked.

"I want you to get a proper look at it."

Rebecca stood silently while I fussed. Somewhere in her two bags she had a set of gold Sabbath candlesticks, brought from Germany in the 1800s, and said to be 150 years old.

Catherine crawled into the back seat of the car, and rearranged the overflow luggage to make herself a snug sleeping nest.

"As soon as we hit the interstate, I'll fall asleep." She laughed. "Wake me for breakfast."

Breakfast. I had packed a month's supply of pink slurry, but this coming morning I thought I might dare something whole.

"Last chance, Eckharts; remember something now, or wait for the movers to bring it, months from now."

"I can't think of anything," Catherine said.

I shook my head.

Rebecca turned the key in the ignition. "Then we're off."

We had always been free to come and go as we pleased, but in practice we had never left Genomex together for any reason without a GSA escort. I had the heady sensation of somehow getting away with something vaguely forbidden.

Leaving the parking lot at this hour required the swiping of Rebecca's keycard. The chain link gate topped with three strands of barbed wire rolled back.

Each of us still carried our Genomex keycards and a badge serving to locate us. We could return all of these to security by mail, but by that time all the coding would be outdated and useless. There was nothing unique or advanced in their design, nothing not used in dozens of facilities. The difference at Genomex was the frequency of changes and the irregular periods of time between changes, whimsically dictated by what Rebecca thought should be done that morning. Sometimes coding changed consecutive days; sometimes it stayed the same for a month.

"This is the right thing to do, Mason. We both deserve some good years after Genomex."

Good years after Genomex.

I would have to become accustomed to the idea that there was something after Genomex. My world had narrowed down to Genomex in 1991. For years I dreaded infection so much I never went more than five miles from the site, keeping medical treatment minutes away.

Yes, there would be good years after Genomex.

"I haven't been on a long road trip since the 1980s. I'm going to have some fun."

Rebecca laughed. I liked the sound of thisher light-hearted laughter. Genomex had weighed upon all three of us for too long.

"What sort of fun did you have in mind?"

"Years ago…in another lifetime…I saw the most extraordinary collection of paintings on black velvet in a truck stop store."

"Do you mean the awful portraits of Elvis kind of painting?"

"Exactly, except that these paintings were all of trucks. One of them had little electric lights every place a truck would have them, and of course they worked. If I see anything like that, I might just buy it."

Beyond the gate stretched a short access road connecting the Genomex parking lot to the residential neighborhood surrounding the complex. Fortunately, Rebecca was driving slowly, anticipating the speed bumps in the street beyond when a pair of figures loomed up ahead in the roadway; she turned sharply, almost leaving the road. Unfortunately, she had not locked her door, which was opened from the outside.

"Get out of there, Rebecca. Now."

I hadn't been sure after the glimpse I had of the faces in the darkness, but I had no doubt about the owner of that voice.

"To hang in your closet?"

"Well, yes."

"It really had lights that worked?" Catherine asked from the depths of the backseat.

"Do as Adam tells you, Rebecca."

I did not recognize the woman's voice, but it could only belong to Lilith.

"Adam, don't you ever weary of these tiresome little dramas?""Yes."

"How special."

Beyond the gate stretched a short access road connecting the Genomex parking lot to the residential neighborhood surrounding the complex. Rebecca was driving slowly, anticipating the speed bumps in the street beyond. The road was poorly lit. Suddenly, two figures were visible in the headlights, blocking our passage. Rebecca sighedbraked hard, and unbuckled her seatbeltswung the car sharply to the right.

As soon as Rebecca released her belt, Adam lunged into the car, and dragged Rebecca from her seat with such force she could not keep to her feet. He then dropped her to the pavement.

I wasn't completely sure what I had seen.

"We have some questions for you. Where's Jesse?"

"What happened?" Catherine asked.

I did not give any conscious thought to what I did next. I leapt out the opposite door and around to the pavement as quickly as I could in my state. I heard Lilith sigh, and say, "Adam, that was excessive," but I didn't care about anything except Rebecca sprawled on the pavement.

"Catherine, whatever you do, stay down out of sight or go stealth."

Adam had his back to me; used to my never presenting a physical threat, he ignored my presence. My cane was made of heavy wood; I put everything I could into swinging it back then down with force into the back of Adam's knees, breaking the cane in two. Adam howled, and fell down, kneeling, one hand on the road surface.

"Do something, Lili."

I reached down, and steadied Rebecca, moving away from the howling Adam.

The driver's side door was thrown fully open from the outside. Rebecca habitually locked the door behind herself, but just once she had neglected to do so.

"Get out of there, Rebecca. Now."

Adam's voice was unmistakable. Adam and Jesse must have come here together.

Lilith stood quietly, watching Adam. Then, she replaced her gun in its holster, smiled, and walked up beside Adam. "Adam, it is time to leave."

Lilith then did something I thought impossible. Lilith was thin, not muscular, and did not give the impression of strength. She seized Adam's neck in the crook of her right arm, braced his head with her left hand, and twisted Adam's head at an unnatural angle, acoompanied by the sounds of tearing and breaking. She then pushed the body away from herself. She smiled.

"I don't care what happened to Jesse Kilmartin, and Adam had become a burden and a nuisance. I still hate you for killing Paul, but murdering you for that would be weak, emotional, and human, and I am none of those things. I have no argument with you. I just gave you your lives, I ask you to return the favor, since I know you're both armed. Allow me to leave peacefully."

"Do as Adam tells you, Rebecca. I know you're both armed, but so am I, with a clear shot to your head at close range. All the advantages are mine."

I did not recognize the woman's voice, but it could only belong to Lilith.

"I'm releasing my belt with my right hand." Rebecca paused before moving. "I'm surprised to find you involved, Lili. Little dramas like these are much more Adam's style." She reached down and released the buckle.

She kept smiling as she turned away. She stopped just short of the darkness beyond the reach of the streetlight. "Oh, and I'll be careful to leave an especially low and messy heat signature so your story will have substance. Humans aren't strong enough to do what I just did, anyway." She vanished into the darkness.

At the sound of the buckle unlocking, Adam lunged into the car, seizing Rebecca by her left arm, pulling her out far enough so he could reach under her right arm. He dragged her out with such force and speed that she could not keep her feet as he hauled her from the car and across several feet of pavement.

"Is Adam really dead?" Rebecca asked.

"I have one question for you. Where's Jesse?"

"I think so, but I'm not going near the body. Let someone official define him as lifeless."

Before she could say anything, Adam dropped her to the pavement.

"I gave no conscious thought to what I did next, but leapt out of the other side of the car, cane in hand, moving as fast as I could manage to the other side. From what seemed far away, I heard Lilith say, "Adam, that was excessive and not needed." She had lowered her gun, but it would not have mattered to me if she hadn't.

Adam stood over Rebecca, sprawled on the pavement. He could probably see me in his peripheral vision, but he was intent upon Rebecca.

"Where's Jesse? We tracked him here."

I swung my cane back, then down with all the force I could apply, delivering a blow to the back of Adam's knees, breaking the can in two. His legs buckled as he howled in pain, falling down to the pavement.

Rebecca started to sit up. I reached a gloved hand down to her and steadied her as she stood.

"I'm going to be sore, but everything seems intact."

"Do something, Lili," Adam demanded.

Lilith did. She replaced her gun in its holster.

"We've, well, more accurately, Adam's lost someone. Jesse Kilmartin. Would you know anything about him?"

"No. Mr Kilmartin no longer works for me."

"We did track him here." Lilith shrugged.

Adam raised himself partway off the ground, one hand still on the pavement. "Jesse got inside, and something happened to him there. That's why his trail led to Genomex, and why the signal died. What are you two doing out here at this time of night, anyway?"

"Getting an early start to a vacation day," Rebecca said. "My left shoulder really hurts. Ever the gentleman, aren't you?"

Anger-driven, Adam stood up, glowering at Rebecca. He took one step towards her, and I put myself between them. Then, he came for me.

Lilith then did something I thought impossible. She lunged towards us with the speed and grace of a hunting cat, but it was Adam she seized, gathering his neck in the crook of her right arm, while bracing his head with her left hand. She twisted his head to an unnatural angle, with audible breaking and tearing.

I saw the life leave Adam's eyes.

When Lilith was sure she was done, she released the body and pushed it away from herself. Then she smiled.

"I realized I did not care what became of Jesse Kilmartin, and then I realized that Adam was becoming a problem. I can train others to take his place in the lab. If I ever want to retry Adam's genetics, well, I have quanto-gazillions of his wrigglers chilling under liquid nitrogen."

"Just like that?" Rebecca asked.

"Why not? It was the rational thing to do, and no punishment exists commensurate with the pain Adam has caused."

"What about us?"

"Well," she began, looking at me, "I hate you for murdering Paul, but I know why you did it. I tried to stop him, too. And you, Rebecca, I'd never hear the end of it from Kurt if I harmed Catherine's stepmother. I think you should get back in your car and continue wherever you were going."

"What about this?" I asked, pointing to Adam's body. "Is he really dead?"

"Oh, yes, he's dead, past repair. I'll take care of this." Lilith bent down by Adam, then tossed him lightly over her left shoulder, then picked up the two pieces of cane."

Thus burdened, she stood before us, showing no sign of strain or effort.

"Paul engineered me to have several times the strength of a human woman my size. He thought I might have need of such strength. I'll put Adam where he'll never be found, fear not."

"I have every faith," Rebecca said.

"Drive carefully." Lilith turned and strode off into the darkness where the Pseudo Sow awaited.

"It's time to hit the road," I said.

"How long since you drove a stick shift?"

"1991."

"It better come back to you in a flash. I'm too sore to drive."

Catherine popped into view, standing close by. "It's all over, just like that?"

"Maybe. I think so. With Adam gone, we're free."," I said, turning to Rebecca.

"I know."

Every morning in Africa a gazelle wakes up.

It knows it must outrun the fastest lion, or it will be killed.

Every morning in Africa a lion wakes up.

It knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve.

It doesn't matter whether you're a gazelle or a lion.

When the sun comes up, you'd better be running.

-Sheikh Mohamed Al Maktoum