A few hours later, in the early afternoon hours, I was going over some things. Larry suddenly stood up. "Okay, I got news. Good news is that we now have enough of the medicine to cure 300 people!"

"Hey! Wait to go, Larry!"

"Yeah, the sort of bad news is that there might be some questions regarding as how effective the bacteria might be, especially in people who've used drugs prescribed to them by their doctor to reduce the tumors. And we also have, uh, scandalous news."

I dropped my pencil. "Scandalous news? Why would we have scandalous news? What is it?"

"Well, some newspaper columns like to make your life miserable. Especially those based in the US. They're calling it Anarchy in the Monarchy. About you and Lilia."

My heart started throbbing. "What about her and I?"

"Well, they spread these, um, rumors about you and her. That you and her have been…you know."

My eyes popped open. "They've been saying that?!"

"Uh, the good thing is that people don't believe that stuff. They've learned to trust you."

I exhaled. "Well, that's good to hear."

"Yes, and oh, three workers are in the hospital."

"In the hospital? What happened?"

"They were attacked by killer bees."

"Killer bees?! We have killer bees? How did they get here? They're from South America."

He shrugged. "Well…I'm guessing that in one of those trips to Brazil, we uh, might have picked up several thousand six-legged two-winged black and yellow stowaways."

I sighed. "That's all I need in life. Killer bees."

"We've already taken measure to contain their spread. We've contained up to 75% of them."

I got another text at that moment. "My aunt is in critical condition. Please, do something, quick!"

My heart started racing. I could feel my stomach doing somersaults. I got and started pacing back and forth quickly. My mind kept telling me that the time had come to say it. But my heart kept saying that it wasn't time. I didn't know what to do.

My mind pictured Lilia's family. And the huge smile she had when I told her the secret. Then I knew what I had to do. "Larry?"

"Yeah?"

"It's time."

You should've seen the look on his face. He knew perfectly what I was talking about. "What?!"

"I said it's time. The time has come for us to announce it."

"But, but we agreed to wait one more week."

"That's too long! If we announce it now, we could save a lot of people from death a week from now!"

He sighed. "I understand. I'll call a press conference immediately and tell them to hold the frontlines of all the newspapers of the country. The world does need to know. Why don't you go home and I'll take care of it."

I sighed. "Thanks buddy." I patted him on the shoulder. "Well, see you tomorrow."

"Sure. See you."

I grabbed my things and left, with my mind at much more ease. When I got home, I had my dinner, showered and went up to bed. I told everyone I didn't want to be disturbed. I said I had a headache and needed the extra rest.

The truth is, I didn't really want to be around when the news came out with it. I don't know why, but I just didn't want to be around anyone when it was announced. I tried to get a good sleep that night. But I couldn't. My phone kept buzzing with missed calls and text messages. I could hear a lot of talking outside on the streets.

The next morning, I left about fifteen minutes before sunrise, trying to avoid bumping into anyone. Surprisingly, I was successful. I was the first one to arrive at the office. But just in case, I tip-toed quietly down the stairs to my office.

I walked in and found Larry already there. He had fallen asleep on his desk. "Hey, Larry. Larry. Larry! LARRY!"

"Huh? What? Lilia and Spiny, I know pronounce you husband and wife." He opened his eyes and looked up at me.

"Larry, you were asleep. You know, asleep? The antonym of being awake."

"Oh, right. Sorry." He got up and stretched. "Well, aren't you the early bird?"

"Yeah, and I caught the worm sleeping."

"Oh, come on give me a break! I've been all night. I was almost killed after I made that announcement."

I sat at my desk. "What did happen?"

"Oh, well….what do you think happened?!" he sounded angry.

"Hey! I'm just asking!" I made myself a hot cup of cocoa. "So, how did they react?"

"Well, at first a lot of excitement, mostly from common citizens. Skepticism from experts and interrogators. I mean, they didn't really believe it. They were like, 'Are you sure?' A few did outright accuse us of being liars. There's a lot of optimism on the part of other countries. Uh, our enemy countries haven't responded."

I sat back down. "What about the medical community and the pharmacy companies?"

"Uh, quite angry. They're going to lose millions of dollars in profit. They pretty much depend on people being sick to get money. And a few of them outright said that they weren't going to give up that easy."

"Have we got any threatening responses?"

"Uh, no not yet."

Yet. That word really troubled.

"And then," Larry said, "a lot of scientists, those that are world-famous and all have demanded access to our facilities. We've denied them that, but they want to know exactly how it works and if it does work. I mean, there are people, especially those in the medical community who claim it's only a more modernized version of chemotherapy."

"Well, it's a relief to hear that most people are taking it positively."

"There is one thing, though. Our enemies, by that I mean the pharmacy and medical companies, are claiming that the bacteria which we have genetically modified can be dangerous and make the cancer even worse."

"Can it make it worse?"

"Absolutely not!" he slammed his fist against the table. "Well, there is one…it's uh, Cancercerness. It's a contagious form of cancer which can spread if the bacteria are altered in some way."

What. Did. He. Just. Say? "Contagious cancer?!"

He laughed nervously. "It's nothing!"

"Nothing?! Do you realize what would happen if there was an outbreak of that? Everyone on Earth would die!"

He pushed me back into my seat. "Calm down! Now, look, it's not that simple. In order for that to happen, someone would have to mess up really bad while making the medicine or steal the recipe and modify the bacteria on purpose."

"Well, it just might as well happen."

"Yeah, come to think of it, that's not a good defense in case we were taken to the UN Court."

"Exactly! So, I say that we just say that the medicine works just fine and that it's perfectly safe."

"You mean lie? Okay, I can do that."

"Lying?! What do you mean lying?"

"Hey! It's not like they came up and asked me, 'Can you genetically modify the bacteria to do something evil?' And as a matter of fact, they did ask that question."

"Oh, great! And what did you say?"

"Uh…uh…uh…I said no."

"Just a simple no?" I asked.

"Yeah, just a simple no. You see, they were asking me if I wanted to do it. Can't you see it? Look at it from this point of view. They asked me can you do it? And I said, 'no,' because I don't want to do it. But if they would've said, can anybody else do it? Ah! You see?"

I shook my head and smiled. "Yeah, I see. Now I know why you handle the reporters."

"You see reporters are very dumb when they make questions like this."

"Yeah, reporters are not very smart in general. And they aren't very humane and are quite cruel."

"On top of that, the top reporters of international news lines have started flooding in. I tell you, about an hour after we announced it, Anderson Cooper, Wolf Blitzer, Brian Williams, and Armando Guzman all came in by plane at the airport. It's everywhere now. But we have another problem."

"I'd be worried if we didn't. What is it?"

"Some countries have already asked us to sell them some of the stuff."

"Really? Already they want to buy it?"

"That's a problem because right now we only have enough for 330 people. That's why I suggested waiting for time. To have at least for a thousand or so."

"Larry, we have enough people sick in Amarkia. Too much time and too many people have died."

Now, you may be asking yourself, how is it possible that there is cancer in Amarkia where there is no artificial food, no smoking, no illegal drugs, no pollution or any kind, and all that? But remember, genetics also play a role. It's like with obesity. Some people do a ton of exercise and eat only veggies and fruits and drink only water their whole lives, and they stay fat. It's in their genes and they stay fat.

I'm an example of that. For example, I eat quite a lot, maybe because I'm a teenager, but I don't gain a ton of weight. It's something that runs in the family. We refer to it as genetically-advanced metabolism. When I eat anything, even something that's supposed to be really fattening, my body burns it up like crazy. Even if I forget to exercise, which doesn't happen too often.

"And, on top of that, countries like Brazil and the DR of the Congo are saying, 'We helped them!'"

I scoffed. "The same Brazil that sent its soldiers to invade our boats and shoot at our captain?"

"Yeah, well, if we said that, it would heat up hostilities. So, why get into trouble? So I just said, 'Yeah, they helped us by selling the seeds.'"

I shrugged. "Well, in a way, without them knowing it, they did help."

He laughed. "Yeah, and I was like, 'if they're happy, then it's fine with us. No objection.'"

By now, it was almost seven in the morning. We ordered our breakfast. The guy who came down to give it to us seemed very happy and congratulated us and joked about reserving a batch of medicine for him.

At least, I think he was joking.

I hope he was.

Was he?