Runaway Heart

THIRTY-THREE

The DARPA van was parked almost a block away from the Malibu beach house. Captain Silver was asleep on an air mattress next to Pan's cage while a video operator watched a bank of monitors. Captain Pettis was seated in the command chair looking at an infrared shot that focused on the street leading up to the house. They could both smell Pan's dank odor, hear his steady breathing.

Suddenly, Pettis saw a Chrysler drive up the street and pull into Barbra Streisand's driveway, parking in front of the closed garage door. He turned in the command swivel and tapped Captain Silver on the shoulder. "Got something here."

Captain Silver woke up from a sound sleep looking fresh and rested. They squinted at the glowing, green infrared image on the monitor.

Less than a minute later a yellow Toyota Corolla pulled up and parked next to the Chrysler. As a slender Asian woman exited the Toyota, Herman Strockmire heaved his big, wide body out of his car. He lumbered toward the woman, then the two of them appeared to be having some kind of an argument.

"Gimme her plate," Pettis ordered. The video operator pushed in on the back of the Toyota using his twenty-to-one lens, finally getting it full screen: eki 154.

Pettis picked up the phone, dialed DARPA headquarters in Virginia, asked for wants and warrants on California plate eki 154, and waited.

Moments later, a man in Virginia was back on the line.

"Sandra Toshiabi, 1656 Huntington Avenue, Santa Monica, California. No wants or warrants."

"Fax me her DL picture," Pettis said as he hung up. He was already entering Sandy Toshiabi's name into the satellite uplink that connected him to the DARPA mainframe databank in Virginia. Herman and Sandy were just deactivating the alarm on the side gate. The video operator chased after them with his zoom lens, moving in tight on the alarm. But Herman's squat frame blocked a clear view of the keypad.

"Couldn't get the number," the video man said.

Herman and Sandy went through the gate and closed it. The red light went back on as the alarm reset.

"Here she comes." Pettis watched as Sandra Toshiabi's DARPA file came up on the screen. "One of our old flames: Doctor of Veterinary Medicine, Committee to Protect Animal Rights, SPCA, Save the Whales, Greenpeace, Coalition of Conservationists… animal-rights activist." Then her picture came through and showed a pretty Asian woman with black hair and brown eyes.

"Whatta we do?" Captain Silver asked.

Pettis responded, "We got the gene map, so I think we should put your DU over the wall and jerk this problem out by the roots. But we first need to get Valdez to sign off."

"What if Strockmire made a copy of the map?" Silver wondered aloud.

"If he has one, we'll deal with it later. We've got to contain these people now."

"You shouldn't have come here," Herman said, still arguing with Sandy as they moved past the Olympic-size pool. "I told you I'd meet you at your place. Why won't you or Susan ever do what I ask?"

"Because we love you," Sandy grinned. "Besides, what are they gonna do, kill us?"

"Yeah. That's exactly what they're gonna do." Herman led Sandy into the pool house, turned, and locked the door.

Sandy watched as he punched numbers on the keypad, then waited for the alarm to beep, indicating it had rearmed itself. "You're really scared, aren't you?"

"You didn't read the coroner's report on Roland."

"On the phone, you said it's some kind of hybrid, a chimera?" she said.

He turned on his computer, found Zimmy's decoded e-mail, then brought it up. "Here's the gene map." He handed her the laptop, and while she scanned the pages of decoded base pairs he gathered up his extra batteries and cords, then stuffed them into his carry case.

"This is what they're trying to get their hands on?" she said, frowning at the pages.

"We left a copy of that for them at Carolyn's house. They don't know Zimmy sent this one to my computer."

"You say this hybrid is 99.1 percent of a human?"

"That's what the BLAST search indicated."

"That still doesn't make it human, Herman. To achieve standing in federal court, plaintiffs have to be pure Homo sapiens. Add to that the problem of representation and you're out of luck."

"Okay, I'll admit I'm not sure about the attorney-client thing yet, but I've got a great theory on how we can bust the shit out of that Homo sapiens restriction. If I'm right, I think I can get legal standing for this chimera. Once we break that barrier, all the others should crumble right behind it. But we can't stand around here and discuss it. They must have this address, so we need to keep moving. I'm gonna file a TRO against DARPA, but I need to collect my casebooks. I still have some legal precedents to research."

They went into a small bedroom that Herman had been using as an office, then began packing his Shilling Lawyer's Guide and several thick volumes of landmark federal precedents. After he retrieved his black suit, Herman grabbed his toilet kit, and they hurried back into the main room.

"Once an alarm blows in Malibu, the cops have a four-minute response time," Captain Pettis said over the secure sat-phone. "If Dave and I try to do this with just the two of us we might lose containment."

Vincent Valdez was on the line from DARPA's L.A. office with General "Buzz" Turpin conferenced in from D.C. When nobody spoke, Pettis continued:

"This is the same DU that took out the computer thief in San Francisco. He's right here in the van with us. Captain Silver says he's good to go."

"If you use a Development Unit, make sure he has on the abort-destruct vest," General Turpin said. "If it goes wrong I don't want anything left. And Vince…"

"Yes, sir."

"If you use the DU, make sure it doesn't go nuts and start shredding corpses again. Be sure you two sanitize the crime scene before clearing out this time."

"Roger that." Pettis clicked off the transmission. "Okay. Just Strockmire and Toshiabi are in there-maid's day off. No fuck-ups."

Captain Silver opened the cage, then led the chimera to the front of the van. Pan jumped up on the seat and sat looking out of the windshield. Seeing his intelligent gray eyes, Pettis thought Pan's face and ears were uncannily human, but the rest of him seemed more like a standard chimpanzee. Except for the hands. He had hands exactly like a grown man. On his forehead was a new satellite-transmitter camera unit the size of a quarter, mounted on a white tennis headband.

"Two people this time," Captain Silver instructed as he picked up the file photo of Herman Strockmire and showed it to the Chimera. Pan reached out, took the photo, then held it up and studied it. Pettis watched, thinking how strange Pan was. Half man, half beast.

Captain Silver grabbed Sandy Toshiabi's DL picture that had just come off the sat-link, then handed it to Pan. The chimera looked at it and cocked his head.

"No shredding and no urinating," Silver said. "We've practiced this stuff. You know how to do it, right?"

Pan reached down onto his aim and typed on the small computer strapped there.

"Pan understands," the mechanical voice responded from his vest speakers.

"Good."

"Get him in the other vest," Pettis said.

"Is that really necessary?" Captain Silver protested.

"Direct order from the general. You heard."

Norman Pettis grabbed the abort-destruct vest and handed it to Pan's trainer, glad that Captain Silver was in the van, because he hated to touch these strange animals. He watched as Dave Silver unbuckled the normal computer clothing, removed it, then put on the slightly bulkier abort vest.

"Pan, I'm going to give you the knife," Captain Silver said. "You kill these people with the knife. I will also give you a Particle Beam-99. Do not use the PB-99 unless you must. It is only to help you get away if you are trapped."

Pan fingered his armband, hitting several keys. "Pan understands."

Silver then handed one of the particle-beam weapons to Pan, who dropped it into a webbed holster on his vest. Silver put leather gloves on Pan's hands so he could run on all fours, and handed him a knife. Pettis had once witnessed Pan kill a vicious, attacking Doberman in less than three seconds with the combat knife. He opened the door and let the chimera out of the van.

The men watched as Pan ran on all fours, streaking across the street, easily vaulting over the alarmed wall and disappearing onto Barbra Streisand's property.