Guard & Cultivate

By Milton Purvis

From a simple and quiet life in the suburbs, to running from the Police, assassin's and uncovering a world conspiracy, James' life becomes a true rollercoaster, but with more and more seemingly acceptable extreme outcomes.
Can anyone, not usually experiencing the increasing level of intensity, adapt and not be overwhelmed with this onslaught of complexity?
After finding a small clue to a larger puzzle, James and his new found acquaintances end up in danger from an organisation set on complete control.
James' life is now unrecognisable, but living with the realisation that the world is now altered forever, with potentially devastating consequences for mankind.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Milton Purvis
• Release date: Nov 22, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463344323

Milton Purvis

I find that on line communication does not have enough depth, especially through social media, so the use of Facebook etc is not my style.

Book preview

Copyright © 2018 under the writers name Milton Purvis

All rights reserved. Guard & Cultivate or any portion thereof

may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever

without the express permission of the publisher

except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Any copy of this book will require individual purchase.

First Publishing, 2018

Smashwords on behalf of the writer (withheld)

Chapter IGuard & Cultivate

Northern Europe – A meeting of people in a large secret building, with a very smartly dressed and articulate man leading the proceedings.

'We are ready to move through phase three, so all of you are now expected to do your part!’ exclaimed the man on the stage with his harsh Northern European accent.

The crowd gleefully watching all cheered and began to clap while smiling like they have just been shown their presents under the Christmas tree.

The man continued,

'We expect to be through phase three within the year and phase four is the responsibility of all those here with the deepest pockets!'

The command over the audience, the man had, was complete and was enforced by a group of armed men around him, with any chance of disagreement dealt with swiftly and assuredly.

'Go out and ensure our community become the dream we have waited twenty years for', his finishing remarks, just as the crowd increased their cheer and claps.

More cheers echoed while he left the stage, closely followed by his small group of men dressed in black suits. As the men moved through the building, the people in the crowd began to move from their tables and towards the door, some meeting before the hallway to chat to others they seemed to know.

This event was many miles away from the nearest town or city and virtually everyone on the planet was unaware of the implications this meeting would have upon them. The plans were worldwide and the people involved were from all the world's continents, showing stern and determined facial expressions.

Chapter 1 The Reminiscence

A small detached house in an obviously, cliché middle class suburb, just a few miles from the outskirts of a metropolis.

I am James Manron; my life so far has not been too exciting. My parents were fairly well off, living in fair wealth, encouraging me to be successful at sports, but I left school to do some time with the military, gained a trade, left and then attended university where I gained a science degree, qualifications in education and have been involved in science ever since. This story begins in the city of Dena in a country called Isrand. It is a medium sized city, largely involved in Science and Technology.

The local population is quite well off, although there are areas within the city limits considered estates with individuals and families living below the poverty line. The city is successful with its' technological industries, helping to ensure that many levels of earning potential are available to the population. My position is typically middle-class, in an education establishment while teaching and doing research, but mostly aiding in research based projects.

A story was unfolding with all the genetic nightmares of a Doctor Frankenstein and Mr Hyde mutation and no one had a clue on how to solve this potentially world- wide disaster.

I drifted into a sleep after reading about 10 pages of my latest novel; it was a good distraction but not the sort of book that aided free thought. It was long considered why cloning should have been heavily governed carefully by the international community, because the previous methods were not really taking into consideration the potential for long term planning. The negative potential of this lack of stringent governing was taking shape, as this story basically suggests.

The morning broke, like most, with the sound of the six 'o' clock alarm and the music of present day (modern) TV 'talent' winners. A slap at the Snooze button gave some respite to this painful irritant. The short sleep (snooze) was unsettling while work rolled around my mind, bugging like an itch which I couldn't scratch. I was back into the real world with the repeated alarm and yet again some more made-for-masses music.

Some bugging thoughts continued to plague my mind until I was able to sit ready for another day’s work, in front of the morning news on television. Breakfast was the usual cereal and tea, with the sound of the news in the background, most of which was not worth listening to. Something caught my attention, more than usual, regarding a small European country and their newly elected parliamentary leader. For some odd reason the man elected, a Dr Steven Edenerson, was someone I seemed to recognise quite acutely but I was unable to place where I had seen him before. I let the ‘recognition’ issue pass and considered the journey to work; a relatively short journey, but filled with events, considering the amount of traffic on the roads over the distance. I looked out the window, after drawing the curtains, to be faced with a very warm late mid summer morning

In the car, during the journey, the regular morning music played with occasional homage paid to the older genre or ‘classical’ as some of the younger generation may refer to it as. I considered playing a CD, the traffic combined with the radio was too much to deal with, and I longed to reminisce for the good old days of music, when the artists wrote interesting, if sometimes political, music.

Considering this music frustration, a plan to enrich my journey to and from work, was hatched. I decided that I would plan my next five days of car music, gradually going backwards in time and using ‘best of’ CD’s to get a good variety of music from my past. The planning of this music began at 10+ years before going back to about 20+ years in the past. While in a traffic jam, I found the CD’s, which would eventually conclude this plan, kept in my car shoe box to stop them flying around within the car. The first CD was in and playing; I journeyed back to a time, in my mind, when I was a first position Doctor of Philosophy in Genetics at a city University studying the degradation of DNA. This process of DNA degradation, largely accepted as the reason for mortality, was something I was investigating at the time. The mechanism and results of this degradation, when experimented on in different circumstances, was well documented. It seemed a good subject matter for Science to investigate, but had not really yielded any conclusive results to support sufficient sponsorship or financial support. So, the laboratory I worked in, at the University, had other areas of research which ensured a sizeable financial investment for the department.

A large corporate type city University with a very modern exterior with much security to ensure the continued future financial investment of many private companies.

On arrival at work, while looking for a parking space, I thought again about the place and time I worked 15 years before, instigated by my car music which I had just turned off.

The walk from the ‘air conditioned’ car to the ‘air conditioned’ building was quite tiring for a man of forty three years, so with a slight skip I reached the water machine for a swift drink. I considered the work I needed to prepare for; the day was full of the mundane management meetings and inspections of the laboratories. This type of working day I had desensitized myself to, over the last few years, paid the bills and gave me some nice stuff but was not as fulfilling as I had expected this area of work would be. The technique of blanking myself off to the mundane would help me to get through the day without making any statements, to work colleagues, too near to the truth. The morning flew past and I did the checks on the post graduates work, as well as some study work for the class I had on Genetics and the meetings.

Lunchtime arrived slightly later than expected, due to a younger member of staff, deciding in one of the meetings that specific University issues couldn’t be addressed after lunch. I thought that the ten minutes I arrived back ,after lunch, would be an acceptable ‘pay back’ for the thirty lost before lunch. This is a lesson I am unable to learn, as it seems a mission statement, with the response from the rest in the meeting not usually accepted in the manner I wanted it received.

Meanwhile, at a meeting of influential people from across the world in a mountain retreat high in the Alps, one man suggests that the Middle East delegates are slowly coming on board with the members considering the plans put forward. The meeting continues with many other areas of the world being reported on by individuals in the group. Behind the walls of the meeting room are body guards with guns, drivers, and pilots of small aircraft; there were two helicopters on a landing pad outside the mountain building. The Far East delegates had calmed down and were more settled, Africa was becoming settled and the violence was slowly being curbed, South America was also progressing nicely according to the Spanish looking lady. Other areas of the world were a similar story and the 'Chairman' suggested that work begin on the main areas of Asia after the Middle East is more settled. The nodding heads from the delegates assured a theme of unity.

The day ended for me with little more occurring than would affect my position and status. I drove home in the ‘after rush -hour’ traffic, which was easier to deal with and allowed me to concentrate on listening to the radio. The six 'o' clock radio programme repeated the news of the Doctor elected to a Government position in Europe. I was perplexed that I could not remember where I had seen, or met this man before. The remainder of the journey, I distracted my thoughts with my ‘Day 1’ CD music compilation planning.

My wife called me, at home, later that evening to say that her school trip was going well and that there had not been any major incidents. She was a Junior School Teacher with 20 years of experience, not only of children, but of my occasional drifts into imaginary ‘child lunacy’ she sometimes called it. As I ended the conversation, she commented on my slight vagueness and asked if all was well. I convinced her that work had bored me and I was missing her company and presence; it had been two days and I was feeling like I could not settle. My favourite DVD’s were a comfort for me, when I felt a little lonely or unsettled, especially when nothing else was really worth watching on television.

After eating dinner and watching some sport, I settled to an early night and the distraction of my latest novel. Sleep followed shortly, but the dream that night was not one that made too much sense. It involved a man walking a sheep in the park. I was not sure what it meant, but obviously, my mind was not working completely normally, although I did try to work out if there was a secret message in the dream.

The following three days of journeys were a gradual trip back in ‘musical’ time as I travelled back and forth to work. But Friday would get me thinking again about the face on the television I had seen on the Monday.

The radio turned on and the alarm I had set the night before awoke me with a slightly better feeling than the rest of the week. It was Friday and I would be off for the next nine days, for my holiday break. The unfortunate flip-side of this day would be the retirement of my long-time mentor and fellow of the University. Even watching the news and eating my breakfast was more pleasurable and less of a chore today. The news reported events occurring in a Northern European Country with the official placement of Dr Edenerson to his post and some political responses to this appointment. I felt able to recount where I had seen him before, it was when I was at University during the first or second year of my first degree. I was pleased that I could remember where I had encountered this gentleman, and again I had other questions .

The journey to work was accompanied by my ‘Day 5’ CD, which played music I had listened to at about the same era as the time I knew this Dr Edenerson at University; back about 15+ years before. I was now distracted but still aware of the traffic; forgiving more easily, actions of the nervous drivers making amusing mistakes. I was sure that Dr Edenerson had met my mentor, when he lectured back at my University over 10 years previously. Maybe I could speak to my mentor and start a conversation regarding Dr Edenerson's very recent appointment?

I did not have too much work to do, as I had planned to ensure my desk was clear of any backlog. Holiday next week and I did not want to get a call when I was off work regarding something not complete at work. The University was due to do a farewell party for my mentor and the afternoon had been allocated for this purpose. The main boardroom was the location for the party and I had offered to help set up the room for the event.

After the morning, a buffet was set up to replace lunch. My mentor, Professor James, arrived at the boardroom, a bit sheepishly, to all the staff wearily singing ‘For he’s a jolly good fellow’. The staff called for a speech from the Professor after the ‘hip hip hooray’ as part of the embarrassment. Most of the thanks in the Professors’ speech went to the University Hierarchy, with a more meaningful special thanks to the site staff; considered part of the University furniture and genuinely honest individuals. Most of the honesty, mentioned by the Professor, came in the form of the caretaker’s brash way of asking for more consideration on his site. It was easy for staff in superior positions to be inconsiderate when working day-to-day. I was guilty of thinking I was too important to place rubbish in the bin in the past, but I too was put in my place; realising I had been wrong and slightly snobby, although my actions improved and showed more consideration over the years.

The Professor had a story about the caretaker and him sneaking off for a cup of tea in the basement area of the University, because they both regarded the coffee in the vending machines too harsh for men of their standing and upbringing. The Professor would comment on the tea-pot, owned by the caretaker, as being encrusted in tea stains inside and clean as new outside. The caretaker shouted out that it made the tea taste better, to which the Professor reluctantly agreed with him. This story got a laugh from the staff. As a going away present, the Professor had purchased a new tea pot for the caretaker, which was not of new design and seemed to have a classical look about it.

After some rather boring and typical speeches from senior staff, I was given the floor to make my speech. I announced in an honest but emotive voice,

'The Professor has inspired me to do better things',

Explaining that this is how I felt when I had first met the Professor at University during my first degree. I made an Ad Hoc decision to relate my speech to the mysterious Dr Edenerson. My speech add-on regarded the Doctor as an inspiring man and included the fact that Dr Edenerson had done so well too. The look I received from the Professor was one of confusion and slight contempt or annoyance; I felt I had hit a nerve with my speech comments. The staff clapped as I handed over my personal retirement present and wished the Professor my best wishes. I was uncertain whether to try and speak to the Professor about Dr Edenerson, nervously contemplating this for most of the afternoon during the buffet and following small talk.

Eventually I plucked up the courage to make small talk with the Professor personally when I found him leaving for his office. He turned and said,

'Walk to my office', sternly.

He informed his secretary that he was off to gather some paperwork for the senior members of staff at his retirement party. I felt that he was slightly nervous during the short walk to the office. On entering his office, he requested I close the door, as he shuffled through his desk draws and then he asked that I write down a company name on one of his notepads.

Chapter 2 The Obsession

An office, being cleared out by a slightly sad employee after many years of loyal service to an establishment he regarded as a second home.

The name of the company was Inca & Labe's. I had never heard of the company, although Professor James did begin to give me some background to the company history and the types of work they were involved with. The company was originally managed and owned by two brothers, who lent their names to the company, after starting out about 25 years previously. The Professor then requested I help him carry some paperwork in a large box back to the boardroom where the party was beginning to wind down. As I parted company with the Professor, I felt an urge to go back to my office and research the company name just given to me, but I decided to curb that urge until I returned home. I was expecting to see my wife that evening after her long school trip and I felt it appropriate to get home and prepare an evening of take away and a film; just to add another film to my ever increasing collection.

After visiting the store, to purchase another film, I was quite distracted by the day’s events and found myself trying to take note of what my wife was saying. She enjoyed feeding back to me on her weeks' activities with the students and occasionally expected positive responses or at least a comment from me to sound like I was acknowledging her voice acutely. We settled down to the film, ate a nice Chinese; meanwhile the obligatory conversation regarding the actors of the film ensued. The content of the conversation would be where we had seen them before or some fairly interesting facts about them, after which we then cleared up and prepared for bed.

I decided not to read in bed but found an old genetics study book, I had kept from my years at University doing my degree, in a box from the cupboard in the spare bedroom. While reading my genetics book, I found myself wanting to go onto the internet and research the company name ‘Inca & Labe’, but it would be better if I got up a bit earlier on the Saturday morning and have a look. My wife had been away a while and I was feeling that I needed a more physical distraction to feel close and open with my long-time lover. During our love-making, I felt that I missed my wife and that it would be a sad day when we part; if only we could have more time together. Maybe another 40 years? The relationship with my wife seemed to have matured and improved like a good wine over time and it was a nice safe feeling to have in life. I did not feel that my wife noticed my preoccupied mind, but I wasnot completely sure.

The next morning I raised my head at 5:58am thinking that maybe my brain was programmed to awaken at that time and I would never need an alarm in the future. After making some tea and toast I settled down to some research on the ‘Inca & Labe’ company. The computer was in my 'Den' and the sun was shining onto the Carbon fibre roof and slowly heating it up. As a scientist, I knew that as long as the sun was shining, the room would always be warm, even on the cold days.

The website was very modern and 'flash' for an animal and plant genetics company, although the website suggested a huge financial investment from various international private companies. Looking through some of the web pages, I found that the company, still partly-owned by one of the two brothers, had been started in the USA. One brother, Dr Martin Inca (Martin was likely some Anglicized version of Martinique or something), came from Central America and had a PhD in Plant Genetics with the late Dr James Labe (pronounced La-be), of a similar stance, in the field of sheep genetics. He had been involved with a famous Scottish Scientist, before he died, on a sheep cloning project. Dr Labe was working on progressive yield of meat production from animals and the increased growth of the animals, including using sheep genetics to produce improved wool yelds. The rest of the website was typical advertising and not too interesting to the lay-person, although I was feeling compelled to ensure I had all the information I needed, so checked each link.

I logged off just as my wife came down for breakfast, so I prepared some bacon and eggs to accompany the coffee and cereal. She made enquiries about my plans over the next few days; I was quite vague, but there again she expected nothing less; it was just her way of showing interest. Over breakfast, my wife told more stories about her school trips, typically about the students showing silliness and social ignorance to being involved in group activities. Although I listened , I was still preoccupied with my new investigative project.

I wondered about the work done in Scotland with Dr Labe and the cloning experiment. The work on cloning was a subject that worried people, because of many implications and rights of the animals, but the positive aspects were that much of the bacterial and fungal work in science was aiding medicine and private companies. The food production process of Quorn and the like was one such area where you could produce large vats of product using genetic modification to speed up processes which helped yield the fungal product for all the vegetarians to enjoy in various shapes and sizes. The cloned sheep were unfortunately destined to die without any normal animal capabilities or rights. The sheep were not really individual animal, but a company mascot, owned by the company; like the boardroom table in my workplace. This sort of attitude did anger some animal rights individuals and they occasionally showed it by doing spontaneous acts of violence to company property or giving company employee’s nasty letters which used a colourful vocabulary.

I got dressed , then my wife, and we went for a short drive to the nearby supermarket to grab some essential supplies. I could not trust myself not to over indulge in wanton goods to satisfy my personal needs while my wife was away (yet again she was due to go on a short trip abroad); so I promised my wife that I would only shop, during her week of absence, for essentials.

In the shop, I walked around considering how busy shops had become and how they were not fun places to have to deal with on a weekly basis. It was hardly surprising that my wife would shop using the internet when she could. Although the reasons were sometimes just to pacify me. While my wife focussed on gathering the goods and placing them into the trolley, I just occupied myself with looking at new and unusual products introduced to the shelves since I had last bothered to attend a shopping expedition. New products were plentiful and I would read the packets and see what ingredients were contained in them. I queried to my wife whether a BBQ was in order for the evening and if anyone we knew may feel the urge to join us. During her positive and agreeing response, I set off to hunt down some meat. On arrival at the BBQ section, I remembered my friend John was a vegetarian, so it would be considerate to gather him some strange shaped meat-free options. Vegiburgers seemed the safest option, and on inspecting the ingredients, I found that the product was made by a company called ‘Areth’, which, I remember , from my research earlier that day, was a smaller company owned by ‘Inca’. This seemed an odd coincidence, and amusing that I had never read this information in the past, but I further investigated what other food items were made by this company, then luckily, my wife interrupted this obsessive behaviour.

It was lucky that I had been interrupted, otherwise I would read through the ingredients of every product. We needed to leave the shop and make some calls to invite friends to a nice relaxing afternoon BBQ back at the house.

Preparation for the BBQ was actually good fun and my wife and I both seemed to enjoy the time together. I also felt the Neanderthal aggression to create fire, which my wife would exclaim was,

‘like watching a child who has just been given a new toy and the right to do something not normally acceptable’.

This was quite destructive but pleasurable. The BBQ was well alight and all the meat was marinated in various spices and sauces, with the usual ‘secret’ ingredient. John and his wife Sharon were coming over with their eldest daughter called ‘Joanna’.

After a couple of hours with occasional beers and some quite wholesome food, the conversation moved onto work and how I would spend my week off. I explained about the retirement of my mentor and that he had given me a company name and mentioned that I looked at this company. My further discussion explained the whole week’s events regarding Dr Edenerson and where I thought I had seen him before. All this was not seemingly strange to John and Sharon, but by discussing the story with them, I found myself thinking more about the mysterious Dr Edenerson and why I was intrigued. I did not spend too much more time on the subject and we all just tried to have normal conversations for the rest of the afternoon and evening.

The evening finished with my wife watching a Science Fiction movie containing an interesting slant on segregation and then read in bed, meanwhile I continued to try and read my latest novel. Yet again I was unable to read with conviction and did not absorb the book; as my mind was distracted by recent events considering the names of these people intrigued me and as a scientist, it was uneasy because it felt like a sixth sense. I eventually began to drift off to sleep, staring at my wife, who was already in a semi-deep slumber, based upon the soft snoring.

The next morning, the alarm did not go off, which meant that it must be Sunday. After having some tea and fruit, I strolled down the local shop, grabbed the Sunday paper, and during the journey to and from the shops I met the local churchgoers and village people. They, as usual, were living their day-to-day existence with minimal worries; this seemed to be the best way, so I reluctantly joined in this ignorance for the rest of the return journey.

After a full grilled breakfast with my wife and a read of the paper, I spent an hour on the internet looking up the ‘Inca and Labe’ company story. After searching through the company's’ history, I discovered some subsidiary companies. One such company was called Hamarbs (a real estate firm based in Europe) and another called Hotchemels (a farming/food manufacturer located in South America). I wanted to search further into Inca & Labe, but thought that it may be wise to look at the two new subsidiary companies I had discovered. I was getting a little paranoid, which came about due to some 'pop ups' requesting my details, thinking that someone may notice my activities and regularity on specific websites.

This paranoia was so strong; so I decided to load a VPN (Virtual Personal Network) to help me keep my location partially hidden. My further investigating did not produce many interesting results, and after, what seemed too long, I made the decision to spend some time with my wife. My wife was kind enough to make a lovely lunch of roast turkey and stuffing, which gave me the opportunity to spend time with her carving up some discussion about the previous and coming week. This was a nice gentle distraction for me and I acknowledged my wife's kindness in making the lunch by asking her for a nice walk later that day, to which she agreed with a romantic smile.

I decided to take a walk in the evening sun with my wife, which included a swift half at the local. I met an old work colleague during the evening and the conversation, after a few more unexpected drinks, moved to ‘Hotchemels’. Philip was a well-respected scientist, whom, for a long while I had the pleasure of working with a few years back; before I started at my present position. He retired from plant genetics about five years previously and worked for a company who supplied the aforementioned plant company with enzymes that break down sugars into glucose in various forms. The reason he initially found the contract with 'Hotchemels' as amusing, was because the enzymes supplied were considered opposite to the ones the company would want. It is widely accepted that plants produce a sugar based molecule and would therefore not need to break it down, in the common sense, so aggressively- even though plants do a form of respiration. I wondered why, while I walked home from the local pub, with my wife. But I did sleep much better that night without reading my bedtime book; the alcohol had earned its money as a good sleeping aid.

Monday was upon us and my wife had already planned the day with a trip to the garden centre and lunch in the main shopping centre with all its ‘cool’ shops and coffee bars. I did visit the music and entertainment shop after lunch to locate some suitable music for the car. I used some of the afternoon, when I returned home, to research Hotchemels. This time I researched which shops and stores Hotchemels delivered to and on what sort of scale. A very high percentage of the shops in most of the countries were located within 100km

Reviews for Guard & Cultivate

[Louisa · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Steady into the story, would be a good film as it builds up slowly