Simulation: A Pop Travel Novel Read online

  Rajul stuck his chin out. “Of course I did. I mean, I mostly did. I thought we should preserve his remains in case we needed another clone. And to keep anyone from identifying the body if he happened to be found, I altered the DNA. I didn’t think it would matter, since we were dumping him. It was those stupid droids. They chose the lake.”

  “I told you to be specific. You programmed them yourself. You know how literal they are. What did you say? Exactly.” The Colonel had been away from the table for too long. The three of them had finished their salads and no one was talking. He had to return.

  The foolish young man persisted protesting. The Colonel knew the boy wanted to gain notoriety for his technological advances. His goal was to surpass his cousin’s fame. But he wasn’t intelligent enough and had no charisma. He would always be used by others greater than him. Like the Colonel.

  “I was specific. I said to burn the body and dump the sealed remains in a deep lake.”

  “Well, they must have chosen a popular lake, because the remains were found. And since the authorities couldn’t identify it because of the DNA mutations, they went hunting for more clues. I wonder how that could have possibly led them to you.” The Colonel tilted his head.

  The taunt didn’t faze Rajul. “I know! And the detective accused me of making–” he put a hand over his mouth and lowered his voice “–simulations.”

  This foolish boy with his delusions of grandeur was going to ruin everything Crews was working on. He had no time to clean up another mess. And he had the immediate problem of getting Wells away from the women before they started asking questions while he was occupied with Rajul. The uncomfortable silence emanated to him from the table all the way across the room. Wells was coming off as dull with his dim-witted silence. He couldn’t start up a new conversation or answer anything complex without the Colonel directing him. Speaking through the fob, Crews gave the automaton instructions.

  “Wells, you need to use the restroom. Politely excuse yourself.” The base command stored in his memory triggered actions and phrasing for what the simulation needed to say. Only the Colonel’s voice could command the simulation, prefaced by the keyword. This situation had been stressful, but each test made him that much more confident in his creation.

  “If you’ll excuse me, ladies. I won’t be but a minute.” Wells bowed his head to them as he rose to go to the bathroom.

  “Of course, Congressman,” one of the women responded with a smile.

  The ladies gushed at his politeness, which hardly anyone practiced anymore, “Such a gentleman. How nice.”

  Now Crews could concentrate on the nuisance at hand. He went out a side door into the alley and blasted Rajul. “Who are these people?”

  “I don’t know, but I have their faces.”

  “Don’t just blather on about it. Show me!”

  Crews viewed the images and shook his head. He huffed at them. He didn’t know the women, probably some nosey reporters. But he recognized Detective Cooper.

  “Thank you, Rajul. I’ll handle this.”

  Before hanging up on the boy, the Colonel noticed Rajul hesitated.

  “Go on, Rajul. Holding anything back will only make matters worse.” Especially for you.

  “Yes. Well. I thought I should tell you I worked with my cousin on all this before starting my own business. They might go asking him about it too. Maybe we can blame this on him somehow.”

  The spineless electrician had no family loyalty. He stole his cousin’s work hoping to present it first and take all the credit. He even wanted to eliminate him as competition. Pitiful.

  “Hmm. I’ll look into it. If that is all, I shall speak with you later.”

  Rajul pouted and nodded as the Colonel disconnected. That boy was the Igor to his cousin, Dr. Frankenstein. And completely illogical. Frame the genius philanthropist? Ridiculous. The boy obviously didn’t have the finesse to handle unexpected turns of events. The Colonel had dealt with intrusive reporters and detectives before. These weasels were no cause for alarm.

  Before walking back inside, he spoke into his lapel pin to Echo.

  “I need you to put a tail on J.L. Cooper, that detective we talked about.”

  “When would you like it to begin?”

  “Immediately. Link me up when you have eyes on him.”

  “Certainly, sir. I’ll locate him using your clearance on the city cams and put Matilda on him.”

  “Fine. Good. I don’t need the details. Just do it!”

  “Yes, sir.”

  What a nuisance!

  On his way back into the restaurant, Crews pulled up the image of Mr. Cooper and stroked his chin. A smile crept onto his thin lips. This complication could work to the Colonel’s advantage.

  Atlanta, GA

  Wednesday, June 17, 2082

  ello, Geri! So long no see! You must be calling to congratulate me. Oh, listen to me. I’m a poet as well as a celebrated scientific genius!”

  Geri smiled at Hasan’s youthful face grinning at her from her work compucenter imager. He looked the same at twenty-nine as he had at nineteen. Handsome, in his charming way, he had caramel latte skin which set off his dark mahogany hair and eyes. The only thing that changed was his clothes, always dressed in the latest fashion. Same playful, hyperactive brainiac. Same self-absorbed egomaniac.

  “Congratulations, Hasan. What did you do?”

  While he talked, Hasan waded through piles of clothes and shoes in an enormous walk-in closet. It was easily as big as Geri’s entire apartment. Inspecting items of clothing and flinging most of them at a servant droid following him around, Hasan laughed.

  “Why, I won the Wolf Prize in Medicine for my biogen laser, is all. There’s a big party tonight in Tel Aviv.” He spoke to his servant as he dug through a drawer, “Oscar, where is my pink cummerbund?”

  Distracted by Aimee bouncing in her chair across the desk from her, Geri thought she might have to restrain her. She frowned at the girl.

  “Hasan, I have a question for you.” Geri knew it would be tough to hold his attention, so she got right to the point.

  “Oh, I appreciate the offer, but I have a date, thank you. Some Prime Minister’s daughter is meeting me there. Isn’t that hilarious? A blind date for such a prestigious award event. I wonder if she’s hot.”

  And this was exactly the scenario she’d been hoping to avoid. Hasan assumed everything was about him, and miscommunication often followed unless things were carefully explained. Unfortunately, Geri had exhausted all other avenues of research. She even considered popping over to Hungary to interview the doctor Chris told her about in the lab to keep from getting Hasan involved. He was a wonderful person and a lot of fun, but he really needed to look into medication to help him stay focused. It amazed her how he had accomplished so much without it.

  “Yes, Hasan. But I wasn’t… Listen. This is important. Do you think you could stop rummaging through your clothes for a few minutes and help me?”

  Hasan threw down the clothes he’d been holding and blinked at the imager, as if just realizing she was there.

  “Certainly, Geri. My apologies. Oscar, continue to search for that cummerbund. I’ll take this call downstairs.” He fiddled with his QV, pointing it at the imager.

  “Yes, sir.” The droid had quite a task ahead of it. Hasan could open a whole department store with all his discards.

  “Won’t be a minute, Geri.” Hasan put her on hold.

  A distorted, close-up picture of him appeared wearing a goofy grin, standing in a just-a-moment pose with his index finger raised. Geri shook her head at it and smiled. Hasan had no qualms about his self-image.

  A few seconds later, the real Hasan came back on, sitting behind a desk with his hands folded in front of him. He panted, a little out of breath from jogging through the huge house.

  “There. That’s better. Now what can I help you with, old friend?”

  There was that word again. Old.

  “Right. We wanted to ask you so
me questions about DNA research.”

  “DNA? I put that aside months ago. Old news. Historic. I’m working on the waste disposal and recycling problem. Much too inefficient. It’s needed a complete overhaul for decades. Have you ever seen a garbage dump city? There are hundreds of them. It’s disgraceful! Pretty soon there won’t be any vacant land left—just landfills. We can’t have that. We need room to expand and grow food and not be on top of each other.”

  “What about a space station?” Aimee asked.

  “A space station? Yes, I’ve thought of that, but we don’t want to abandon Mother Earth. And that would take—wait. Who is that lovely flower bud behind you, Geri?” Hasan strained to see around her.

  Geri sighed and rolled her eyes. What’s with these men and a young, pretty face? She knew the answer to that question, but the constant distraction was tiresome. Geri gave him a quick introduction.

  “Hasan, this is my new partner, Agent Aimee Boscowicz. Aimee, Hasan.”

  “Enchanté.” Hasan smiled widely and bowed his head to Aimee, keeping his eyes on her.

  Aimee put a hand over her mouth to cover her tittering. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Rakhi.”

  This is a professional FBI agent? Geri was ready to lose her lunch.

  “It’s Doctor, now. And please, my dear, call me Hasan.”

  Snapping her fingers a few times, Geri guided his attention back to the problem at hand before Aimee could respond with more star-struck nonsense.

  “Hello? Hasan. DNA. Current research. Listen, we found remains of a guy and we can’t ID him. His DNA is unmatchable and his own samples don’t even correspond to with each other.”

  Hasan touched his chin and looked toward the ceiling, his thoughtful pose. Exaggerated for Aimee, no doubt. Men.

  “Hmm. Sounds like someone contaminated him.” He nodded.

  “Yes. But how?”

  Hasan’s gaze lowered to the corner of the imager. “Oh, sorry, Geri. Could you hold on a moment? I’m getting another call.”

  Geri huffed. “Fine.”

  This time while she sat on hold, a montage of Hasan doing various jumps and dives into a pool entertained her. What a goofball. Hard to stay mad at him for long. She sighed.

  “Hello, Cooper! My man! My buddy! What’s up? What’s the goal? And how do we get there? I know you are calling to congratulate me, right? Everyone I know is!”

  Same old Hasan. Cooper never understood a word he said. And Hasan was always a little full of himself. But he deserved to be. It looked like he was at his desk in his office. Cooper hardly ever caught him sitting still in there.

  “Of course. Congratulations. What’s the occasion?”

  “I won the Wolf Prize in Medicine. It’s a very prestigious award. And I’m getting ready to go to a huge party tonight in Tel Aviv to celebrate. I have a hot date and everything. It’s going to be a blast!”

  “Good for you, buddy. Hey, listen. Do you know anything about simulations?”

  Hasan waved his hands across the imager while he spoke. “What? Simulations? Non-existent. All research and development was killa-boshed. No one wants to open that salami!”

  Those mixed metaphors again. “Uh, okay. But I think I may have found one.”

  Hasan’s eyebrows popped up. “Really? That’s very interesting.” Before speaking again, he stared off for a moment. “Oh, yeah. Say, I have another call holding, could you wait a sec? I’ll be right back.”

  “Sure. You know, Hasan, if this is a bad time, you could call me back.”

  “No, no. I won’t be a minute! Don’t go away, okay?”

  “Okay.” Cooper leaned back on his couch to wait.

  Hasan pushed a spot on the imager and a music video of him doing karaoke played for Cooper. What a ham.

  “Geri. Are you there? Sorry about that. What was I saying?”

  “You were telling us about DNA contamination.”

  “Right. Yes. I worked on that with my former colleague, Rajul Varma. You remember him, don’t you, Geri? My evil, twisted cousin?”

  “I never met him, but I do remember you complaining about your cousin and how he followed you around like an annoying flea when you were kids. I didn’t know his name was Rajul.”

  Aimee tugged on Geri’s sleeve and whispered, “Rajul sounds a lot like Rage.”

  Geri shook her head at the girl and mouthed I know. It irked her she hadn’t recognized him sooner.

  Hasan didn’t seem to notice their exchange. “Well, Rajul is the one who came up with the idea to conduct experiments to contaminate DNA on purpose. I saw no need for it. And when I took up the call of the garbage problem, I scrapped my DNA research. There were plenty of others working on it. But Rajul, he was so greedy. Always looking for ways to make money. First he sold old pictures he had of us when we were kids. I let that go, because who wouldn’t want a picture of cute little me? But then some of my stuff went missing, like my toothbrush, and some clothes and shoes. I caught him selling them on UBuy. I had to fire him and send him away. My own cousin!” Hasan pounded his fist on the desk.

  “That’s terrible!” Aimee chirped over Geri’s shoulder, looking up from the notes she’d been typing on her QV’s notescreen.

  “I know, isn’t it?” Hasan rested his head on his fist. Geri recognized the gleam in his eye. He was ready to start flirting. He certainly didn’t need any encouragement from Aimee to get off topic.

  Geri cut through their little tête-à-tête, “Hasan. Yes, that’s too bad. But did he take anything with him when he left?”

  “No, he was escorted from the offices downtown with just his own belongings.”

  “So he still had his QV?”

  “Probably.” Hasan realized what that meant and pouted. “Oh. My fail.”

  “Don’t worry. We’ll find him. You don’t happen to know a way to decontaminate DNA, do you? So we can identify our victim?”

  “I might. I will have to look into it.”

  “Great. When would be a good time for us to come over and try it?”

  He tapped his cheek. “Hmm. How about Saturday evening at six o’clock for dinner? Aimee too, right?”

  Geri looked back at Aimee. She nodded her head so hard, Geri thought she might decapitate herself. She would be a huge diversion, but also a treat to dangle in front of Hasan and keep him moving along.

  “Sure. Whatever.”

  “Perfect! Then it’s a date! Bring your appetites, ladies. It was a great pleasure talking with you. See you then.”

  “You too, Hasan. Enjoy your award ceremony. Bye.”

  Though they signed off, Aimee couldn’t stop smiling. “Thank you so much for having me come along.”

  “You’re my partner. Of course you’re coming. To work.”

  Geri was not looking forward to getting Aimee and Hasan in the same room together. She might have to bring a hose.

  “Hello, Cooper. Sorry to keep you waiting.”

  “Huh? What’s that? I must have drifted off.”

  Hasan waggled a finger at him. “Oh, Cooper. You jokester.”

  “That’s me. So what can you tell me about simulations?”

  He put a finger to his lips. “Shush! Those things are illegal!”

  “I know. And like I said, I think I might have found one. Do you know who might be able to make one? You haven’t been busy in that lab, have you? Making some extra money?” Cooper rubbed his fingers with his thumb.

  “Heavens, no! But they’re very complicated. I admit I dabbled with the cloning process and android programming, hoping to improve my guard androids. I wanted to make them able to learn and not rely wholly on commands. They were so dumb and incompetent. Recycling material with cell phones for brains!”

  “I get it, Hasan. They’re stupid. So what did you do?”

  “Well, I wrote some new programming. That helped, but I wanted them to be more life-like as well. You know, to fool trespassers. Not the standard recognizable faces from a limited selection. I worked with my uncle and borrowed his met
hod of growing cloned skin and human tissue for his cybernetic prosthetics.”

  “A clone android. Did it work? Did you ever make a complete simulation?”

  “Well, yes. But it was before they were against the law. We made a couple, but they didn’t work very well. I wonder. Maybe if I’d been nicer to them… And there was a formula… “ He shook his head. “Any-however. Once I realized the ethics entangled in the concept of what I was doing, I destroyed everything. It had been easy to get wrapped up in creating an almost-person…” Hasan stared off into space. “It got a little scary when the government took notice.”

  “Hasaa-aan.” Cooper sing-songed to bring him out of his memory sequence. “You said we. Who worked with you on them?”

  “Oh, Rajul. Hmm. He’s popular today,” Hasan mumbled the last bit.

  “What? Rajul who?”

  “Uh, nothing. Rajul Varma is my underhanded cousin. He leeched onto my camel train while I was in India and took advantage of my wealth and status. When he asked to come to the States with me, to help me and possibly start his own business, I made the mistake of bringing him. He got incredibly worse. He found some bad people who were terrible influences and promised him riches if he worked for them. And apparently he’s changed his name to Rage. When the powerful enemies of his new bad friends became his enemies, he had to hide out at my house after getting beat up a couple of times. I finally had to cut ties with him. I have no idea where he has buried himself. Oh, I hope he isn’t buried. That’s not what I meant. You know what I meant, right, Cooper?”

  Wow, this boy can ramble. So Rage was Hasan’s cousin. That figured. Cooper knew that twerp couldn’t have come up with a working simulation on his own. “Of course. That’s too bad. I will look him up. Thanks, Hasan.”

  “Sure.” Hasan pursed his lips. He was holding something back. Something he was worried about. Cooper could tell.

  He gave him one last opportunity. “If there isn’t anything else, I’ll let you get ready for your big night. I’ll call you later to tell you if I find out anything.”