For Seth, freedom now was a process. A process he had to fight for every day. Because every day, someone was out there, waiting to grab him and take it away. And he still had not had the chance to tell his story to the audience it was intended for – the American public. Whatever he said from Russia would be censored in the mainstream American press. What would get to any media outlets would be downplayed as coming from the mouth of a traitor and a spy. Seth had left America. He couldn’t very well claim he was a good American citizen and wrap himself in the flag while he was, at the same time, hiding out in the enemy’s backyard.
He was officially charged with violation of the Espionage Act, and he didn’t expect that he would have a chance to tell his story if he were caught. He would probably end up in Guantanamo Bay prison with the rest of the traitors and “terrorists” who are held without the right to counsel and without proper trials, and all because of the label assigned to them on their arrest. Seth couldn’t count on the Constitution to protect him any more than he could expect his leather jacket to stop a bullet.
Yuri didn’t understand what the “big deal” was about genetically modified foods, or why Seth’s own government wanted to kill him. But the stakes were high. Hundreds of millions of dollars had been spent on GMOs by the big chemical companies. They had decided that genetically engineered foods were the foods of the future. Those same chemical companies had inserted their top management into the top management of the United States government. They controlled the FDA. They controlled the USDA. In third world countries, government officials get bribes. In the States, they get job security with large corporations like Germinat.
The government knew the GMO food they allowed to be put on the tables of the American people was not safe, but they certified it as safe. And Seth had irrefutable evidence of this in secret government reports. Not only that, he had in his possession a classified report that revealed this technology was being developed to be used as a powerful weapon. They could not let him live.
6
Yuri picked up Seth and took him to a rundown boxing gym, which smelled like dirty socks. The wooden floors of the gym were covered with soft matting.
“What are we doing here?” Seth asked.
“Well, spy man, you need real spy training so you can survive out there. I’m gonna give you training,” said Yuri, handing Seth an oversized and baggy jacket. Yuri himself was wearing the same kind of jacket. He looked like a worn out Michelin Man.
“Is that what these stupid jackets are for?”
“Exactly. This is Russian Sambo, best way to defend yourself without weapon. Put on jacket.” Seth slipped it on.
“Anyone hits you, you hit back, harder. Smart ones stay alive. Best to be prepared like Russian Pioneer. First thing I show you is back flip. Now, you come running at me like you are going to attack.”
Seth ran at Yuri and he easily flipped Seth over his back, onto the mat, and pinned his helpless body against the mat with his torso; then he pushed down with his left hand on Seth’s arm and raised his right fist within striking distance to his throat.
Yuri released his stronghold on Seth and stood up. “Get up,” he commanded. “Now you flip me.”
“What?”
“It’s easy. I come running at you,” said Yuri. “You take me by elbows and pull me to you. If you want, hold jacket at elbows and pull. Then bend right knee, crouch down and roll me over your back.”
Yuri charged Seth, and Seth grabbed Yuri’s elbows. “Now, bend right knee, crouch down, and roll me over your back.”
Seth tried and tried, but each time, he was not able to incapacitate Yuri.
“This is no use Yuri.”
“Shut up, never give up. Again!”
After much trial and error, Seth was able to flip Yuri. “Now pin me down.” Seth did.
“Good!” said Yuri.
Seth practiced throwing Yuri over his back until he was good and sore.
“Now I show you front blocking. I come at you, and you take me by elbows, pull me into you and trip me with leg.” After practicing this a couple of times, they went back to repeat both exercises.
“Okay, now I show you how to get out of handcuffs and zip tie cuffs.”
Yuri taught Seth how to fashion a makeshift key and pick the lock of handcuffs and made him practice with them both in front of and behind his back. He taught him how to break apart zip tie cuffs by centering the zip tie cuff lock between his hands and breaking the lock with a fast hit against his butt or his stomach, depending on whether he was tied in front or behind his back.
“Since you are such good student, now I show you how to defend against gun or knife. Now you put gun in my face.”
Yuri handed Seth his gun. Yuri turned his head out of the way, and at the same time, grabbed the barrel of the gun with one hand and struck the wrist holding the gun with the other, rotating the barrel and putting pressure against the trigger finger.
“Now you break finger,” he said. “Then after snap finger, rotate upward, shift body and throw him, kick head and step here, take gun, then shoot that fucking son of a bitch.”
Yuri was a good teacher, and insisted Seth meet him to practice self-defense and work out at least three times a week.
“You never know when you may need it,” he said. And you got nothing to do anyway.”
7
Seth had successfully installed himself into his new life in the Far East. It was cold most of the time, but sunny. The people were very nice, but he couldn’t communicate with them very well. And it was just as Yuri said – go to work, go home; nothing before and nothing after. At home he would work on his memoirs. Someday the entire story would be told, if he could stay alive until that day. Now he had to concentrate on being safe. For now, this monotonous routine was keeping him out of harm’s way.
Seth wasn’t hot on the idea of consorting with prostitutes, so he made a compromise with Yuri and was actually able to meet some women (pre-screened of course) using the excuse that he needed to work on his Russian language. Teaching his English class was not so difficult, as the teacher’s text pretty much outlined each day’s lesson, and he had an “English only” policy in his class. As was the case with his high school Spanish teacher, nobody was allowed to express themselves in their native language; only the language of study. Since this was a university level course, and all his students had many years of English lessons, he could get away with it. And, thankfully, nobody had asked him any questions yet about the English language that he could not answer or bullshit his way around.
Seth actually enjoyed discussing classic literature with his students. He assigned his favorites, like Steinbeck and Dickens, and never tired of answering questions about them. But when it came to grammar, he was completely incapable of explaining anything, unless he read the explanation verbatim from the teacher’s edition.
It was even more of a grind on the weekends. Yuri, his only friend, would check in with Seth every once in a while and bring him some English language DVD’s from the local video store. English books were nowhere to be found, except the classic English literature from the university library, but Seth had a decent secure Internet connection and was able to download some e-books. It was like this, day in and day out, and the days sort of blended together. And then it happened.
It was before class on the first day of the week. The Director walked into the classroom with a beautiful girl. She was tall, with long light brown hair tumbling around her shoulders and the most luscious honey sweet lips he had ever seen.
“Seth, this is Natalia,” said the University Director. She’s a recent graduate and will be your new teaching assistant.”
Seth blanked out for a moment, finding himself staring at those luscious lips and her cherub rose cheeks.
“Oh, Natalia, I’m happy to meet you.”
“Natasha.”
“Natasha?
“Yes, it’s the diminutive for Natalia. It’s what my friends call me.”
“O
kay, Natasha.”
“Well, I’ll leave the two of you now, said the Director. Seth ignored him.
“I didn’t know I was getting a new assistant,” said Seth.
“I didn’t know I was going to be an assistant,” she said. “I thought I was going to be an English teacher.”
“Well, I’m not really an English teacher, so…” Seth said, like a bumbling, nerdy idiot scientist. He had to control himself.
“What?”
“What I meant was, we can’t always have our first choice, but maybe it leads to something better.” Finally an intelligent phrase, thought Seth.
“I suppose you’re right. Now, at what point are you at with the class?”
“Right to business, eh?” Seth had mastered the art of “eh” and took every opportunity to show off how Canadian he could be.
“Of course, we are in a university, not a night club.”
“Yes, well…”
Seth wandered over to the desk, trying to be as suave as possible under the circumstances, picking up the textbook.
“Here is the text. And we are about here…”
“Ah, form identical to infinitive used as a present subjunctive.”
“Uh, yes.”
Seth didn’t know an infinitive from a subjunctive, but it was pretty easy to read the teacher’s text and pretend to teach English. It wouldn’t be so easy anymore with an expert looking over his shoulder.
“I have an idea,” said Seth.
“What?”
“You want to be a teacher right?”
“Well, it wasn’t my first choice, but it is my profession.”
“What was your degree in?”
“Philology.”
To Seth that sounded like philosophy, but he didn’t want to give in that he hadn’t the slightest clue of what “philology” was, so he just nodded in an understanding fashion.
“Right, well what I was thinking ‘aboat’ (another Canadianism that Seth had mastered to perfection) was that you could teach the class and I, as the master, could concentrate on some of the more deeper subjects in English and maybe do some lectures and lead study groups on English literature.”
“That sounds great.”
“You have an American accent. How did you get that?”
“Oh, I lived in America for a few months. The work and travel program.”
“Oh really?”
“You’re American, right?”
Oh shit, here comes the first lie. “No, actually I’m from Vancouver. People get us mixed up all the time.”
“I see.”
The class started to pile in and take their seats, regarding Natasha with passing curiosity. As the last student took her seat, Seth smiled at Natasha.
“Well, we’d better get to it,” said Seth. “Class, this is Ms. . .”
“Andropova.”
“Yes, Ms. Andropova is my new co-teacher and she will be teaching the class today.”
The process of meeting someone new, especially someone of the opposite sex, can be awkward, but it also can be rewarding. This meeting seemed to Seth to be the beginning of something nice.
8
Seth enjoyed the company of his new assistant. Initially taken by her stunning appearance, he was now captivated by her personality. She was intelligent, had a wonderful sense of humor, and despite their 24 year age difference, he was becoming quite absorbed with her. Usually, a girl was either pretty or nice. Natasha was both beautiful, and perhaps the nicest person he had ever met. Seth and Natasha started spending all of their off-time together. At coffee breaks and lunch breaks, there was never one without the other. It was like another world when Seth was with her, and that’s the only world he wanted to be in. Yuri was not as enthusiastic.
“No, out of question. Too dangerous,” Yuri told him, furiously.
“Yuri, it’s been four months already, and nobody has tried to kill me.”
“Yet.”
“I’m not asking you to break the rules, just bend them a little.”
“So you can see girl? I told you, we have lots of girls. More girls than men in Russia. Every man can have two if he wants, or three. You want to have sex, I bring her here for you.”
“It’s not that.”
“Oh, I see...”
“What do you see?”
“American spy is in love.”
“Stop calling me that. And I’m not in love.”
“Whatever you say, spy boy. Okay, I bend rules, but only little bit.”
“A little bit doesn’t count,” said Seth, using a line from an old Russian song.
“I should never teach you Russian pop culture, wise ass. You can take her out, but where I decide, and I watch.”
“Yuri, I didn’t know you were a voyeur.”
“You know what I mean, smart ass.”
After a couple of weeks of “teaching” together, the ice between Seth and Natasha was completely broken. They spent all of their time away from work together as well, going out to dinner every night, and meeting for coffee when they weren’t going out to dinner. It was as if Natasha satisfied Seth’s every need for companionship. When he was with her, he had no desire to be anywhere else, or with anyone else. How strange that such a peace could overcome him in a land so different and so far away.
Natasha was mature beyond her 21 years. She had an “old soul.” And because of the superior education system in Russia, and the late blossoming of pop culture from the western world, which began trickling in freely during the 90’s, it was like they had grown up in the same era. They had similar tastes in music, and both loved movies, which they watched in English at Seth’s apartment, and occasionally watched a Russian film at the theater, which Natasha would translate in Seth’s ear. Not only did it open the language for him, the tickle in his ear from her whispering was very pleasant.
The only bad part about it was that he couldn’t share it with anyone. So many times he had been tempted to just reach out by phone, or even the Internet, to his parents, or to his best friend in the states. But Yuri warned him that the U.S. government was listening in to all phone calls to and from the States, and intercepting all emails from foreign locations to the United States, and Seth was a “hot potato.” He could not risk revealing his location.
How was it possible, he thought, for the government to wade through so much data? Yuri said they looked for certain “key words,” just like Google. And of course anything associated with Seth would be a “key word.” The government was hacking in to emails, and Facebook accounts; nothing was private. They monitored and stored information from two billion phone calls and emails every day.
The Internet was a double edged sword. It was the government’s worst nightmare, because of its freedom from regulation, but it made spying a lot easier. And the U.S. thought nothing of spying on its own citizens. What was a little unconstitutional activity in advance of the public good? It allowed freedom of speech to run rampant on the Internet. Not because it was guaranteed by the Constitution – plenty of constitutional freedoms had been modified, limited and curtailed – but because the government would rather have the people mouth off than let them exercise freedom of thought, so the Internet had turned into a huge gossip interchange. As Eleanor Roosevelt said, “Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.”
Seth was completely cut out from the outside world. Even his Internet connection was so secure; it could not be used for communication. When he did research, he was isolated by a “Chinese wall” of electronic protections. He almost felt like he was being censored himself.
He never wanted this clandestine life – the secret life of a spy with no glamor. Everyone knew that the echelons of private industry in America were the ones who ran the government. It was obvious. The head of the SEC was the former head of the NASD. The heads of the USDA and the FDA were composed of ex-top executives from his ex-employer, Germinat Corporation, and that was no secret. In fact, his boss had been running
back and forth between the government and Germinat for years; a recharging of evil, he supposed.
Science is a powerful thing, and powerful things come with responsibility. Manipulating genes and mixing species with other species had dangerous implications that required that responsibility to insure that no disastrous consequences result. Any change in the evolutionary chain of one species could affect the lives of hundreds or even thousands of others. This is a responsibility that Seth had never taken lightly, but, unfortunately, Germinat did. The bottom line was the company’s only motivating factor for what it did or did not do.
It was no secret that genetically engineered foods were controversial. So controversial that his company and the other big chemical companies spent millions of dollars on PR campaigns to convince the public that GMOs were the promise to end world hunger and malnutrition. And they would spend millions more to fight labeling to prevent Americans from knowing what they were eating, while their cronies at the USDA and FDA silently allowed genetically engineered foods to occupy up to 70% of the American table. Europe had already had its “coming out” when the only independent researcher was able to finally talk to the public about his findings on GMOs.
The dirtiest secret was that the entire process was flawed, and the flaws caused multiple repercussions that they knew about and probably thousands more repercussions that would not be discovered for years. Three billion years of evolution had forged a twisted, complicated path of genetics that mankind was only on the verge of discovering. Like once believing that the earth was flat and at the center of the universe, at the beginning of genetic engineering, we believed that each gene in a sequence of DNA was responsible for creating a single protein that produced a single certain trait, like blue eyes or fish that didn’t freeze in freezing cold water. Little did we know that one gene could create proteins to produce many different traits. Instead of testing our theories, we forged right into production, forcing genes of one species into the DNA of plants, thinking they would create one desired effect, but the process of creating that one desired effect produced multiple effects we hadn’t counted on. And those effects were deadly in many ways. The government knew how dangerous it was and, not only did they let it happen, they certified it as safe. Seth was no longer happy to sit on the bench and be quiet. He had to be removed from the team.