Transmutation

  His lips moved slightly, and she thought she read part of it.

  “Yes. I know you love me, too. And you know I love you, too.” He seemed to rest at that.

  “Bless me, too, Dear God, that I may be strong and know what to do to help him most.

  “And God bless Marie, for she brought even more love into our lives. Make her well and strong, and help me to fill her life with joy and appreciation, that she may know how much we love her, too.”

  He stirred again.

  “Yes,” she said to both God and him again, “Yes, she loves us so much, and we love her, too.” She thought she noted a response in him. It was so slight, she wasn’t sure, but she knew he loved their little girl as much as she did.

  Lori gripped his hand more tightly, hoping it would reassure him.

  “Is that your father?” A nurse came in the room with a smiling face, gloved, half-donning her gown, no mask. John was in isolation at Lori’s request, via the doctor, not to protect others from him, but to protect him from them, bacteriologically. He was so frail.

  “Isolation procedures, please!” Lori said in earnest through her mask. “It’s posted by the doctor!” The nurse backed out, annoyed. Then Lori finished, “No. He’s my husband,” she said after her.

  “Oh,” the nurse was embarrassed at her comment. “I’ll come back later.”

  “It’s a common assumption. But it was my fault,” Lori said, a little less sharply, staying by John’s ear while talking with the nurse. “I was late.”

  In truth, she was early, just in the wrong place for a while.

  Then Lori looked beyond the nurse. John’s primary physician lingered in the hallway with a sad look in his eyes.

  Low hung stratus clouds grayed everything for hundreds of miles. The sea was dark and flat, lifeless. The air was a damp chill that penetrated every bone in her body.

  Lori and Marie walked the isolated beach together.

  Marie was such a natural bird dog, and she didn’t even know it. They’d never been hunting. But no matter what, she still had to be fifty feet out in front, and then she’d walk side-to-side, a limp on her right hind leg, looking for anything fun to play with. When she was younger, she’d run side-to-side and everywhere else like a wayward quark finding its infinite paths through the universe, but at her age, and with her illnesses, she was doing well to hobble. It took heavy pain medicine every day to keep Marie going. Without it, she couldn’t even get up.

  Lori suddenly turned on her heels to walk in exactly the opposite direction, a fun game they’d played all Marie’s life, so Marie—always game—hobbled as well as she could to get fifty feet out in front of Lori, glancing back, tongue hanging out of her mouth, seemingly to make sure Lori noticed she’d done it, and to share the fun. Then she scouted dutifully around for something fun to find. Irritated seagulls fled. No sense of humor.

  Lori froze in her tracks. Her eyes filled with tears.

  Daddy will never see that again!

  She melted onto the sand, crumbled on her own legs. Her face distorted into a cry, and she screamed her anguish outloud to the cosmos in a long, painful wail.

  Marie came over and nuzzled Lori, no more play in her heart. She knew something was wrong.

  Lori wrapped her arms around Marie’s little warm body and held her close against the cold. Her tears soaked down her cheeks onto Marie’s soft fur—as soft as a little girl’s. More like hair, than fur, she’d always felt. She held Marie hard against her and kissed her cheeks, her forehead. Marie licked her mother’s nose.

  How could she discuss the wonders of the universe with Marie? How could she tell her about life after death? How could she beg Marie for help, when she knew Marie couldn’t understand? How could she ever explain that she could have saved her father, but he wouldn’t let her?

  “No,” he’d said. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to live. He did, she knew. But it was his belief that the world wasn’t ready, yet, for those cures.

  “Life is the most precious thing in the universe!” Lori had shouted at him. “And yours is so bright!”

  He was unmoved.

  “The most precious thing in the universe,” she’d shout again. “You hear me? Out of all the atoms that exist, of all the cosmic dust that collects, of all the suns that form and cook molecules, then blow up and scatter them throughout the universe, some reorganize into beings like us! Life! Beings who can think about everything else! Move independently. Live and love! It’s a bloody miracle! Life is the most amazing thing in the universe! Death is such a loss, such a waste, to never live again! A beautiful spirit lives and learns how to live, and then at death— What?! Nothing? It’s all gone? You spend a life-time learning things, developing who you are into something that’s really coming together, and then you die, and it’s all gone?”

  She had been persuasive.

  But it did no good on him.

  “It’s not all gone, then,” he told her.

  “Kwai Chang? Ripples in the pond, Grasshopper?!” She said in anger, truly pissed off, mocking his philosophy.

  He smiled and hugged her. “Not only that.”

  She knew. He believed in a spiritual life after death. A brilliant man, a Nobel Price-winning physicist, he was really a simple man. His view of the cosmos was uncluttered with her complexities.

  He’d hugged her in his weakening arms.

  “I can do something about it!” she demanded through his shoulder. “You know I can!”

  “I know. But don’t,” was all he said.

  And she knew, now, she should have done it anyway.

  John!

  Lori held onto Marie more tightly.

  Marie leaned against her as she had so much lately.

  “I wish I could tell you, Honey.” She paused trying to impart a spiritual message to her little one, along with her words, in the hope Marie might on some level understand. She couldn’t say it out loud, and she couldn’t continue any more.

  Her face distorted into a wrinkled mess. Her mouth opened in a silent scream, as she cried, relentlessly, against her darling’s neck.

  In time, when she could speak, she screamed outloud to John, God, and everybody: “No, damnit! NO!”

  Marie jumped a little, but stayed in Lori’s embrace.

  Lori held Marie’s face far enough away to look into her eyes. “No! You’re not going to die, too. You hear me?”

  Lori wiped tears off her face with her shoulder.

  Marie heard her, but was concerned for her mommy.

  “You’re going to live, you hear me? Come on!” Lori got up to go, taking an always-eager Marie with her.

  CHAPTER

  2

  Still in efficiency mode, not willing to take any chances with heart attack, stroke, automobile accidents, meteor strike or anything else, Lori raced home at legal speed to save her daughter’s life.

  Look for cars.

  Mind the lights.

  Use turn signals.

  Head on a swivel.

  Drive safely.

  Get home in one piece.

  Don’t let anything interrupt or delay this!

  It had been far too long in coming. She just couldn’t go against John on it while he lived. His will be done, she had said so many times in her mind, disregarding the famous quote. He was such a great man.

  But she’d be damned if she’d give up her daughter’s life for it now. She didn’t have to. She didn’t need to. She knew how to save her.

  John had known about Lorelai. “The world isn’t ready for that,” he’d told her. It could cause wars, economic disasters, upset the whole balance of world cultures. They need to discover it for themselves. Don’t spring it on them…”

  And she’d gone along with him, while he lived.

  Lori stopped for a red light, perfectly just before the threshold, waited cautiously but impatiently for someone to cross the stree, then looked carefully both ways and turned right on the red l
ight.

  Marie sat on the passenger seat, riding patiently, looking at Lori.

  Lori glanced at her.

  The English Springer Spaniel seemed happy for the look.

  Lori wiped a tear from her eye with her right hand, as she looked at all nearby traffic. She put her right hand back on the dog and turned on her left blinkers and turned the car left onto the next road, both with her left hand.

  “Good girl,” she said to Marie. “Mommy loves you so much.”

  Life, she knew was life. A person is a person; it didn’t matter if she was a dog! You know love! You learn things! You gather life experiences, and then all for what?

  You die and you’re gone?

  She wouldn’t stand for it.

  After all, Lori was human, wasn’t she? She’d been human for, like, years! What difference did it make where her knowledge came from? She was as good as any other person, and she had something to contribute.Yes, it was going to rock the boat, maybe upset the boat—so everybody on the boat’s going to have to learn to be responsible!

  The alternative was worse, she knew, to just go around and let everyone die all the time!

  “To Hell with that!” she screamed at the universe over her steering wheel.

  Marie looked over at Lori from the right seat and asked, with her eyes, if she could get on Mommy’s lap for the drive.

  “Sit tight,” Lori told Marie. “Momma’s working. You’ll see.”

  Marie seemed disappointed, but settled down in her seat.

  Intersections.

  Turns.

  Watch the speed.

  Watch the cars.

  Home.

  Driveway.

  Garage door up.

  Lori backed the car into the garage—like always. It was the safest way, because she could clear the area visually before backing in, which would be harder to do if backing out.

  She pressed the remote in the car to lower the garage door and realized she hadn’t taken a breath in a while.

  She let out some air.

  Thank you, God, for getting us here safely.

  John really had influenced her thinking. Before him, she never prayed like that.

  Lori got out of the car with Marie close behind her, happy as a clam, hobbling on that right rear leg.

  She walked carefully into their unassuming, 34-year-old tract house, habitually clearing it—sights, sounds… She looked around. It appeared normal: Swiss Coffee off-white ceilings, knockdown texture, the faintest yellow walls in the living room with comfy-floral quilted furniture, John’s brown leather furniture in the family room… The house alarm was beeping at her; she turned it off.

  “Lwaxana,” she said commandingly. “Status.”

  “The house has not been disturbed,” said the computer in a clear, distinct, female voice. John had programmed the computer—did he like the actress or what? Lori could have programmed it, but John was having fun.

  Marie went to lie on her blanket by the fireplace in the family room.

  Lori locked the door to the garage and visually checked as well the front and side doors, both within view.

  “Close the curtains,” Lori said to Lwaxana. “Lock the doors. Secure the house.”

  Lori saw a couple of the curtains close that had been left open, heard subtle clicks as already-locked doors locked again.

  “The house is secure.”

  “No internet connection now?”

  “The house is secure. There is no internet connection at this time.”

  “Open the vault,” Lori said.

  “Vault opening.” The computer’s voice was pragmatic.

  The family room couch moved away from the wall to expose clean tile flooring underneath, then a large section of the tile flooring rose to the side, hinged along the baseboards, to reveal a staircase leading down into a basement. John had recommended an elevator there, but Lori knew from long experience that low-tech was best. In a small, isolated operation like this, surprising things could go wrong, sometimes, Lori was often alone, the stairs couldn’t break, and Lori was very sure-footed.

  “Marie,” Lori called to her love. “Come on.” She smiled at the dog and patted her right thigh with her right hand.

  Marie looked happy at the invitation and got up, hobbled over to Lori, then followed her down the stairs.

  The lights came on automatically as they entered.

  Where the house had been unremarkable in every way, the basement was ultra-modern. It was a rectangle, about ten by twenty, with what appeared to be stainless steel walls, ceiling and floor, an array of equipment along all the walls—with what would have appeared to be a CT scanner against the back wall with some large mechanical beams leaning over it from the back side, adjacent to the wall.

  Lori squatted beside Marie on the floor and talked to her. “Honey, I love you.”

  Marie licked Lori’s nose.

  “You see that?” Lori pointed at the large machine, and Marie even seemed to look at it.

  “Mommy’s going to help you.” Lori tried to seem calm and unuurried for Marie’s benefit. How would she live with it if Marie had a stroke while she joked? “Lets get up on it.” Lori reached under Marie with both arms and, with some effort, lifted the 50-pound dog onto the human-sized platform.

  Marie sat down on it, happy to do anything.

  “Now stay,” Lori told her daughter with a sincere effort at a smile, holding her hand in front of Marie’s face, palm out. ‘Stay’ was not Marie’s greatest skill. “Gimme a second.”

  Lori’s tone of voice changed, became business-like.

  “Ready the subject.”

  Marie looked around.

  “She is not human,” Lwaxana said.

  “I know. She’s not human,” Lori told Lwaxana. “But we’ll learn.”

  A pattern materialized on a holoscreen in front of Lori, as if on a computer screen, but there was no screen, and Lori watched while it changed several times.

  “Adjust to it,” she said sternly.

  Lori reached out to touch the screen in an evolving pattern, sometimes with multiple fingers simultaneously, sometimes with only one. Once, the screen halted, and Lori looked at it with a warning, and it continued.

  “Scan her again.”

  Marie looked like she wouldn’t sit still much longer.

  “Gentle neural relaxation,” Lori told the computer.

  Marie’s eyes drooped.

  “A little more.”

  Marie slowly slumped into a restful sleep.

  Lori turned Marie so her head and spine were along the machine’s longitudinal axis, then reached over to slightly adjust her head, again.

  “Secure her.”

  Two straps emerged from below to cradle Marie’s head, and only her head.

  CHAPTER

  3

  Lorie and Marie got off the elevator on the sixth floor of the ultra-modern law firm’s office building, walked right past the receptionist’s ultramodern desk and down the hall toward Bernie Katz’ ultramodern office.

  Marie ran ahead of Lori to investigate everything in the hallway.

  “Stay out of the conference room, Marie!” Lori ordered. “Get ahold of yourself!”

  The look on Marie’s face resembled a question, a demanding, “Why!” but she complied with her mother’s request.

  “Wait!” the receptionist yelled as they disappeared down the hall, but they were gone before the word was finished.

  No time to waste. Too much time had been wasted already.

  Lori pressed the latch of Bernie’s office and walked in.

  “Bernie!”

  Bernie looked up at her, but he was on the phone. He held up his hand for Lori to wait. “Yes, Your Honor. I’ll bring my client there tomorrow morning at nine.” Silence for two heartbeats. “Yes. We’ll do it. We won’t be late.” Two more heart beats. “Bye, Judge.”

  Lori stormed the rest of the way in and remained standing. Marie prowled around the office sniffi
ng things, went over to Bernie for some love.

  Bernie knew what had happened. “Lori. I’m so sorry for John.” He extended a warm hand in comfort. Her husband had become his friend, as well, lo these many years.

  Lori’s armor broke. She teared and sat down in a chair across from his desk.

  He handed her a tissue box. She took two.

  “What’d you do with Marie?” Bernie asked patting the eager dog on the head. “She looks as spry as I’ve ever seen her.”

  A secretary showed up at the door, but seeing Lori was welcome. The secretary backed out and closed the door.

  Lori still didn’t speak.

  “I loved him, too,” Bernie said. “Best person I ever knew.”

  She regained some of her composure. “Bernie: You’ve handled his patents well through the years, and I need something else from you.”

  “Name it.” He leaned forward on his desk to give her his full attention.

  She handed him a nine by twelve envelope, with not more than thirty pages in it.

  He looked through the envelope’s contents, including a check for fifty thousand dollars.

  “This is real?” He shook it, tasted it, held the check up to the light.

  Lori showed no humor at his joke.

  “That’s a retainer. You’ll charge me more later.”

  “Oh, good,” Bernie said. “Love that. But what for?”

  “I need you to form two companies for me, and get some more patents—not for inventing the thing, but for my process of using it.”

  “Two companies?” It was a non-thinking statement. She was obviously serious.

  “The details are in there: one for the company, the other for me. I need you to drop everything as soon as possible and do this.”

  Bernie began looking at the other papers from the envelope. He glanced up at Lori. “What’s this?” He glared at the papers. “You did what?”

  “How long to form the companies?” Lori asked. “How long to codify that the invention is mine?”

  “I can—” Bernie stuttered. “Drop everything?” He looked at her papers again. “These companies will do what?!”